3 Strange Bedfellows (18 page)

But luckily the
clichés seemed to hit the spot. Mr. T. slowly put his arms back down to his sides and straightened his legs. Then he burst out into the worst coughing spasm I'd ever seen him have, and that was saying something. He gasped and doubled over in pain for what must have been a full minute or two. I was afraid he would die on me anyway, whether I shot him or not. Actually, him dying of natural causes here and now might be the best thing that could possibly happen.

But he didn't die. Slowly his coughs subsided and he straightened up.

"Let's go back up to the house and get warm," I said.

He nodded and silently began trudging up the path to Grandma's house. I stayed right behind him, the gun held high. I didn't think he'd try anything, but why take chances?

As we went up the front steps, a light came on in Grandma's living room. The gunshots must have woken somebody up. When Mr. T. opened the front door, with me on his heels, we were immediately greeted by the sight of Andrea, Bernie, Derek, and Grandma all standing in the living room staring at us. That's when I remembered I was still stark naked.

Grandma found her tongue first. "What in God's name?"

"It's a long story. Mr. Tamarack," I said, keeping the gun trained on him, "why don't you go sit on the sofa. Hannah, do me a favor and call 911. And Andrea, how about getting me a robe?"

"What about me?" Bernie asked.

"Yeah," Derek chimed in. "What should
we
do?"

"Just thank God it's over," I told them.

17

But it
wasn't
over.

Hack Sr.
—now that he didn't have a gun anymore, I was thinking of him as Hack Sr. again—sat on Grandma's living room sofa not saying a word. He did plenty of coughing, though. I felt silly getting a glass of water for a man who had just almost killed me, and who I was now holding a gun on. But I didn't want to be stuck listening to him hacking until the police came, so I brought him a drink.

When the local Lake Luzerne cops arrived fifteen long minutes later and took him away, he was still mute. I guess he was thinking up what story to tell. Because later that night, when Saratog
a's finest showed up at the Warren County Jail to interrogate him, he was ready for them.

He confessed to Chief Walsh and Lieutenant Foxwell that he was trying to kill me, but he refused to explain why. Furthermore, he categorically denied killing either Zzyp or his son.

Chief Walsh came to Grandma's house early the next morning and told me about Hack Sr.'s denial. "But that's ridiculous," I said, outraged that Walsh actually seemed to believe him. "I'm telling you, he basically
confessed
. When he was marching me off to the pond."

Walsh gave an irritating shrug. "Not according to him."

"But—"

"He says you kept telling him he killed these people, and he didn't say no because he didn't feel like getting
into it with you. So you took that to mean yes, but it didn't."

I tried to remember la
st night's mostly one-sided conversation. Technically, Hack Sr. might be right—he didn't explicitly state that he killed anyone. "But still," I said, noticing a whine in my voice and adjusting to get rid of it, "just from the way he spoke, it was obvious he agreed with what I was saying."

Walsh shifted gears. "By the way, why
was
the old man trying to kill you? Not that I blame him, of course."

"I haven't the foggiest," I replied, still giving Susan Tamarack and her family a
wee bit of privacy after everything they'd been through.

The chief poked away at me with more questions, but I stoutly professed ignorance. "Look, Burns," he declared finally, exasperated, " you may think you're cute. But you're obstructing two murder investigations."

He had a point, and eventually I'm sure I would have given in, but it turned out I didn't have to. Later that day, the police were able to match Hack Sr.'s gun to the bullet they recovered from Zzyp's body. That was all the evidence they needed to book him for Zzyp's murder.

Interestingly, Hack Sr.
's gun had filed-off serial numbers—just like the other gun that had killed Hack Jr. That convinced the cops that Hack Sr. had done both killings.

Hack Sr. held fast, though. He continued to deny the allegations and defy the allegators. He did amend his story, now claiming tha
t he went to see Zzyp early Sunday evening about a campaign matter and found him dead on the floor with the gun beside him.

Zzyp's wing of the mall was deserted at that hour, Hack Sr. said, and he was frightened the killer might still be lurking nearby. So he picked up the gun and took it with him for protection when he left Zzyp's office.

Then he never gave it to the cops because, in his words, "I didn't want anybody knowing I was at this fellow Zzyp's office in the first place. Wasn't nobody's business." He claimed he was planning to ditch the gun that night, but then decided to shoot me with it instead.

The way I learned about Hack Sr.'s revised statement was from Dave, my cop friend. It was Dave, too, who rang my doorbell two days later and gave me the word: Hack Sr. had finally broken down and confessed to both murders.

The old guy was still acting cagey about his motives, though. All he told the cops was: "I killed 'em because I wanted to. Ain't that good enough for you?"

And it
was
good enough. The cops had their man. So I figured there was no need to inform them about the wife beating and illicit sex that had motivated Hack Sr. to kill his own son.

I
still wasn't exactly sure why he killed Zzyp, and maybe I never would be. But I let it go and allowed my life to return to normal. My family moved back home to Saratoga, we got the busted window repaired, and my kids lost their fear of sitting in the computer room. With the bad guy captured and in jail, Bernie Williams had three dry nights in a row and Derek Jeter didn't walk in his sleep—at least, so far as we knew.

As for the Shmuck-m
an, his "to be or not to be" moment was long forgotten and he campaigned with renewed zest. He still wasn't talking about real issues much, or if he was, the media buzzards didn't report it. But they did report, repeatedly, his impassioned declarations about having been an innocent man unjustly accused. He came across great on TV, like the hero of a real-life courtroom drama.

His two opponents rocked back on their heels. Inspired by Judy's scoop in the
Saratogian,
the buzzards were all over Pierce for details about his dealings with Sarafian; and even though both of them steadfastly protested that they were 110-percent pure, Pierce's campaign was on the skids. I wondered if Linda Medwick was still sleeping with him. Probably not.

Meanwhile, Susan Tamarack had cut way back on her campaign appearances after her father-in-law was arrested. On the positive side, the media gave her a lot of sympathy for having a husband who got killed and a father-in-law who went postal. But there were also whisperings that she herself might have been involved somehow in one or both of the murders. No one had anything concrete, and none of the buzzards wanted to take on the poor grieving widow until they did. There was enough of an unsavory aura surrounding her, though, that her campaign suffered.

On Friday morning, I sat in the back room of Madeline's and read the latest poll results in the newspaper. They showed: Robert Pierce, eighteen percent; Susan Tamarack, twenty-eight percent; and William Isaac Shmuckler,
thirty-six percent
.

I was thrilled for Will
—and for myself, too. For the past few days I'd been indulging in a nifty new fantasy, and now, as I sipped my café au lait and reread the poll results, my fantasy felt more and more real. It went like this: Andrea would take a year's leave of absence from her job, we'd move down to Washington, and I'd be the Shmuck's legislative aide.

Andrea and I had stayed up half of last night talking about this, and we both agreed it could be a very cool adventure. I was enjoying my sabbatical from writing, but sometimes I felt like I was drifting. It would be great to have some exciting work that really gave me a sense of purpose.

As for Andrea, she was more than ready to take some time off from teaching. She thought the department chairman would give her a leave of absence without prejudice to her tenure application, and she could use her free time to write the children's book she'd been meaning to write for years.

So I had called the Shmuck first thing this morning. We'd made arrangements to meet at Madeline's in the afternoon, about five hours from now, and I was planning to ask him for a job then. God knows after everything I'd done for him, I dese
rved a job. How much do legislative aides make, I wondered, and what does it cost to live in Washington . . .

My morning daydreaming was interrupted when Susan Tamarack walked into the espresso bar. She headed straight toward me.

I stood up. She was dressed in black, as always, but she looked even more waiflike than before. Despite all those casseroles, she must have lost five or ten pounds—and she didn't have five or ten pounds to lose. Her face was pale and drawn.

"Ms. Tamarack, I can't tell you how sorry I am," I said, quite sincerely.

She studied me for a moment, then said, "I appreciate your not telling anyone about . . . you know."

I nodded, embarrassed. "No problem."

She sat down and I did too, feeling uncomfortable as hell. "Here's what I don't get," she began. "If you
did
tell people about me and my father-in-law, it would kill my campaign. Your buddy would win for sure. So why don't you do it?"

I squirmed in my seat. I had pondered the exact same question. Thirty years of recent political history, from Watergate to Willie Horton to Monica, told me that I was a sap for not revealing everything I knew. I should fight the Republicans any way I could. Dirty tricks and slimy tactics are the name of this politics game.

But I couldn't help myself. Some foolish remnant of idealism prevented me from using irrelevant personal attacks to get votes.

The widow studied
me some more. She seemed to decide something. "You're a good man," she said quietly.

"Yeah, well, I try not to be
too
good. No future in it."

She put her hand on mine. The sudden contact made me uneasy
—was she flirting?—but I couldn't think of a polite way to remove my hand.

"Mr. Burns, I need your help," she said.

"With what?"

"I want you to find out who killed my husband."

Come again?
Now I did remove my hand. "Susan—"

She stopped me. "It wasn't George."

"But he confessed."

"He lied."

"Why would he confess to a murder he didn't commit?"

"To protect me."

"I don't get it."

"He thinks I killed Jack. And Zzypowski, too."

I stared at her. "Why would he think that?"

"Hey, I had plenty of reason to kill Jack," she said harshly. "He was abusive. He was a sadist. He cheated on me."

A jolt of electricity shot through me. Whoa, maybe she really
did
kill her husband. "What about Zzyp? Why would you kill
him?"

She shook her head impatiently. "I don't know what George is thinking. He won't explain it to me. He won't even
talk
to me. I go to see him in jail and he just . . ." Her voice caught in her throat. "It's horrible. He's so depressed, he's losing his mind."

She looked on the verge of crying, but I tried not to let that distract me. "Wait a minute. If he won't even talk to you, then how do you know he thinks you're the murderer?"

"Because why else would he say
he's
the murderer?"

"Maybe it's true. He did try to kill
me."

"Look, I know George. He didn't do it!"

"There's another thing. You told me that you and George were together the night Jack was killed. So George must know you didn't do it."

She looked abashed.
"George and I weren't really together that night. I was seeing a lawyer about filing for divorce."

"Wait a minute. Linda Medwick said your husband was filing, not you."

Her lips parted. "He was? The bastard. But anyway, I couldn't very well use the lawyer as an alibi. If word got out I was divorcing Jack, it would ruin my campaign. I'm supposed to be the grieving widow and all that."

I rolled my eyes. It hadn't taken this woman long to turn into a typical conniving politician.

The widow caught my disapproval. "Look, why
shouldn't
I get some benefits out of my husband dying?" she declared defiantly. "After everything I put up with from that bastard, it's only fair I should get
something."

"Like a Congressional seat?"

She gripped the edge of the table. "You don't have to like me. But George doesn't deserve to die in prison. They won't even give him bail, because they say he's dangerous. That's insane!"

"Not to me."

"Mr. Burns, I'm sorry about what he did to you. I'm sure he's sorry, too. He's a loving man, a good man, like you."

"Cut the flattery, huh?"

"Will you help me?"

"Why don't you just go to the cops?"

"I did. They wouldn't even
listen
to me." Her lips trembled and the waterworks started. "George Tamarack deserves to die a decent death, in his bed, surrounded by people he loves. I'm begging you,
please
. If you won't do it for George, or me, then do it for my son. You're our only hope."

She was leaning forward, and one of her tears fell into my caf
é au lait. I sighed. "So what's your theory on who done it?"

"Oh, Mr. Burns," she breathed, "thank you."

"Don't thank me yet. I haven't said yes to anything. So let me guess: You're figuring Pierce for the killer, aren't you?"

She pushed a wayward lock of wavy black hair back from her forehead. "Do you remember, you asked me once what Jack was planning to say in that radio debate?"

I eyed her quizzically. "Yeah, you claimed you didn't know. What, is this
another
lie you told me?"

"I didn't trust you then. And anyway, I
don't
know, not really." She leaned forward. "But the night before the debate, I overheard Jack talking to someone on the phone. He said something like, 'Be sure to listen to WTRO tomorrow. I've got something that'll knock their socks off.' "