Comeback (Gun Pedersen Book 1) (6 page)

8

“All I can say is this, Gun. I’ve known your girl for a long time and I think I can read her pretty good. No
way was she giving the nod to Geoff the other night. I
don’t care what the old man told you.”

Gun nodded. After leaving Hedman’s he’d driven
straight over to Jack’s and ordered lunch. It was
eleven-fifteen.

“Lyle’s full of shit, always has been,” said Jack.

Gun finished his glass of buttermilk. Jack didn’t
know of the land transfer, and Gun wasn’t about to
say anything. Nothing he could say was going to make
any difference now. If Mazy had married Geoff, then
Lyle had the best land he could ever hope to ruin.

“You better tell me all the scuttlebutt you know
about this Loon Country deal, Jack. Doesn’t look like
I can stay out of it any longer.” He swallowed a bite of
his burger.

Jack reached for the yellow carton sitting on the

shelf behind him. “What’s Mazy told you? She’d
know more than I would.”

“Not much, as usual.”

“Yeah.” Jack refilled Gun’s glass. “Well, it’s hard to
say right now. The referendum could go either way, is
my guess. A lot of people support Larson, he’s been a
good commissioner for twenty years. On the other hand, you’ve got almost a majority of folks in this
county getting their paychecks from Hedman, not to
say they love the guy. His wife probably can’t even do
that. No, if you’d asked me two weeks ago, I’d have
said Lyle’s proposal wouldn’t go through.”

“But...” said Gun.

“But in the last dozen or so days Reverend Barr has
really jumped on the bandwagon. He can make
Hedman look like a prophet of God. And then there’s
that mock-up of Loon Country Attractions Hedman
set up in the bank. Seen it?”

“No.”

“It’s impressive. The sort of thing that puts a
picture in somebody’s head. You don’t forget it like
you do a pretty speech. I’ll tell you, though, looking at
it, I couldn’t help but wonder how the hell you’re
going to fit a condo, a world-class hotel, a shopping mall, a damn circus midway, and God knows what
else—all of it on that scrap of swampland Hedman bought from Devitz. It doesn’t add up.”

“That’s right, it doesn’t.”

“And don’t forget the talking loon forty feet high. ‘Greetings, friend. Welcome to Stony Lake, your
entrance to the great northern wilderness.’ Or some
such shit. You feed it a quarter, it talks.”

Gun stood up and reached for his wallet. Something
was making his stomach uncomfortable, and it wasn’t
Jack’s hamburger.

“It’s on me,” said Jack.

“Thanks.” Gun rapped a good-bye on the bar, but Jack wasn’t ready to let him go.

“What would Lyle want with Mazy, anyway? Say
she did come up with something embarrassing—”

“Or illegal.”

“Or illegal, right. Even if she did, Hedman isn’t dumb enough to do anything to her. Damnit, Gun,
what’s going on?”

“Hedman seems to think he knows.”

“You don’t believe that rubbish any more than I do.
None of this makes any sense.” Jack picked up Gun’s
plate and glass and set them on the counter behind the
bar.

Gun rubbed his jaw. He hadn’t shaved yet today,
and it was about time he did. Go home, shave, think,
take a few swings.

“Well, does it?” Jack said.

Gun shook his head and took two steps toward the
door. Then, on impulse, he turned. “You think maybe
there’s somebody bigger than Lyle? Somebody putting
pressure on him?”

“What makes you say that?”

“You remember what I told you about Tig’s cat.”

“Sure.”

“‘Course we don’t know Lyle was responsible, but
say he was. Seems like a desperation move. There are
better ways to go about persuading somebody.”

“Filthy lucre,” said Jack.

“And something else too. I think somebody
knocked Lyle around a little bit, put the fear of God in
him.” He told Jack about Hedman’s bruised face.

“That puts a little twist on things. Any ideas
?”

“Not yet,” Gun said.
He turned and headed for the door, stoop
ing a little as he went. It opened as he reached for the
knob, and Carol Long was there. She’d changed into
khaki shorts and a Hawaiian shirt with a pink hibiscus pattern.

“Carol,” Jack called from the bar. “You brought
your legs. Good.”

“Clever, Jack.” Carol smiled at Gun. “He isn’t
well.”

“Observant, though,” Gun said.

“So am I.” She tilted a look at him and glided over
to the bar with a grace not often seen in Stony. She
said, “Sorry I sprang in on you that way this morning.
But I didn’t understand things then, and I still don’t.
What about you?”

“I’m learning.”

“Onerous process,” said Jack.

“Well, I’m glad I found you. This morning I ran into
Reverend Barr at Fisher’s Cafe. Talkative man. You
might be interested.”

“Might be.” Gun moved closer.

Carol Long crossed one leg over the other with a
movement that was frank, even modest, yet the effect
was no different than if the lights in the room had
been snapped off to reveal she had glow-in-the-dark
panty hose.
Gun had to take control of his eyes and tell
himself to pay attention.

“. . .
and he was wearing his collar, dressed for
preaching.”

“It’s eleven-thirty,” Jack said. “He’s probably in the
middle of his sermon right now.”

Carol shook back her hair like a schoolgirl. It was
straight and black except for those rare gray strands that twisted off course like erratic pencil lines of light.
She continued. “I’m sure he wasn’t planning to come in—he’d already walked past the door. But when he saw me through the window, he turned around and
came in, walked right up and asked if he could join
me. I said fine.”

She paused, looking first at Jack, then at Gun,
before going on. “First off, he was acting smug, not
unusual for him, I know. But he was the wrong kind of
smug. M
oney smug.
In
the
world and of it too. No platitudes or significant stares
into infinity. Just plain physical arrogance.”

“What did he say?” Gun asked.

“He asked if I thought my editorials against Loon
Country were doing any good. I told him yes, I
thought so, and he gave me this huge foolish grin. He
was feeling so good he stopped a waitress and ordered
himself breakfast.” Carol lifted her chin and took a
deep breath. Gun and Jack leaned in. “Then he looked
around the cafe and whispered to me, ‘I suppose
you’ve heard the rumor about Hedman’s new land
deal.’ I said no. He said, ‘Well, it’s no rumor. Lyle’s
got an iron-clad guarantee on the best property on
Stony Lake.’ Then he grinned again, real wide, and said he’d always wanted to leak a story to the press.
And he left.” Carol leaned back and was silent,
bottom lip thrust out. She glanced from one man to the other.

Jack’s face looked as solid as the mahogany bar that
reflected its image. His dark eyes didn’t blink. His
forearms twitched in a kind of rolling motion from
wrist to elbow. He said, “Everyone knows you’ve got the choice spot on this lake, Gun. What the hell’s Barr
talking about?”

Carol watched Gun’s face.

Gun didn’t answer, only sighed and withdrew be
hind a scowl that made his eyes disappear. From
Jack’s kitchen came the lazy sound of a country-
western tune crackling through poor reception. Either
Mazy had said nothing to Carol about the land

transfer or else Carol was playing dumb. But the lines
in her forehead looked earnest, and Gun figured she
didn’t know any more than what she was letting on.
“I think you’ll be finding out soon enough,” he said
finally. He tipped his head slightly toward Carol Long
and walked out of Jack Be Nimble’s into aspen shade
and brilliant splotches of noon sun.

9

The bells at Reverend Barr’s church were doing their
post-service chiming as Gun approached the edge of
Stony. On impulse, he turned off Main Street and
guided his truck along First Avenue toward the high-
steepled edifice of red brick. He double-parked in
front of it, sat with his elbow out the window,
watching the parishioners file out the church doors
and down the steps. Reverend Barr pumped hand
after hand, often leaning close to offer words of either
flattery or wit, judging from the response of his flock:
nods or shakes of head, embarrassed shrugs, tossed hands—”Oh, you!” Gun wondered how Barr had managed to squeeze Loon Country into this week’s
sermon. According to Jack, a sometime church
goer, last week Barr had used the parable of the
talents, that great New Testament defense of capi
talism.

Now Samuel Barr was shaking County Commis
sioner Tig Larson’s hand. Larson had a stiff smile on
his face, an anxious set to his shoulders. He escaped
quickly. As he turned onto the sidewalk, Gun eased the truck forward and pulled up alongside him.

“Hey, Larson. Surprised to see you’re still attend
ing.”

Larson didn’t slow down.

“Larson!”

Larson turned, his face uncharacteristically wrin
kled. He pointed at his watch. “Sorry, Gun, I’m kind
of in a hurry. If you don’t mind . ..”

“No problem.” Gun accelerated, watching Larson in his rearview mirror. There was no use talking to
him, anyway.

Turning back onto Main Street, Gun headed west.
He had made a mistake signing his property over to Mazy. A bad mistake, no doubt about it. But it was
done. The question now was how it happened. Had
she transferred the land over to Hedman willingly or
unwillingly? Had she been somehow forced into mar
rying Geoff—or was it her own free choice? Were they
married at all?

Gun swerved to miss a squirrel dodging across the
road, then down-shifted and turned north on the lake road, gave the big eight-cylinder some gas and shifted
back up into fourth.

No, he simply couldn’t feature it, couldn’t even
squeeze the two of them into his imagination at the
same time. It was impossible. If his daughter was
married to Lyle Hedman’s son, it wasn’t because she
wanted to be. A chill shook Gun’s shoulders and
tingled clear out to his fingertips. He spoke out loud,
in order to convince himself. “She wouldn’t,” he
said.

The lake road was rough with potholes. The county
men hadn’t been around yet to repair the damage done by the recent winter’s frost heaves. As Gun
steered the Ford around Shipman’s Bay he caught
sight of old Leo Hardy, alone the last quarter century,
standing tall and mackinawed on his dock. Leo
waved, and Gun tapped two hoots on the horn. It was
a little like looking at himself.

It hadn’t been easy, giving Mazy up after the
accident. It hadn’t taken him long to see he’d done it
all wrong, either. Her visits home were long and
frequent, but her forgiveness was difficult to earn.
They didn’t fight—mostly since she didn’t talk—but
she went out of her way to show Gun he’d been wrong
to let her go. Wrong to make her give him up when she
needed a father most.

If it weren’t for her dreams, Gun might have
thought Mazy was just being stubborn, vindictive. But
her dreams were real, and frequent. They arrived in
the early hours of the morning, a week or so apart. She’d call out in a desperate voice, yanking him from sleep and setting him barefoot on the cold pine floor. He would walk into her room, turn on the light, and
tell her everything was okay. She’d tell him what she’d
just seen: the 737 tumbling out of control, its blinking
red lights spiraling down through the night, the deto
nation of flame, the crack and whoosh of gas tanks
bursting, the wavering pillars of orange terror shoot
ing a hundred feet into the sky. And her father
playing outfield under the bright lights at Bloomington.

Now, bumping along the rutted driveway, sur
rounded by the smells of weeds and flowers and pines,
Gun asked himself if maybe his daughter resented him
more than he knew. He parked the truck next to the
garage. Stepping out onto the uncut grass, he heard
the faint jingle of the phone ringing in his kitchen. He
hurried only slightly, and picked it up in time to hear a
click. He rolled a cigarette and sat at the table to
smoke it. It would ring again.

It rang on his third cigarette. He picked it up.

“Hmm,” he said.

“Dad?”

“Mazy.” Gun sat down on the tabletop. “Mazy, are
you all right?”

“I’m fine, great, just. . . really fine.”

“Where are you? It’s Sunday
...
I mean, we’ve
been wondering where you are.”

“With Geoff. Out at Hedman’s. Got here this
morning. In fact I just missed you, according to
Lyle.”

“What are you doing out there?” He had to ask, had
to hear her say it.

“Dad?” The pitch of her voice was higher than
usual. The tone harder. Her sentences shorter. “Dad,
Geoff and I
...
we’re married. We eloped, last
night.”

There it was. “You’re in trouble, Mazy.”

“No, really, I’m fine. You don’t have to worry. I’ll come and visit. Or no, why don’t you come out here? Lyle says to tell you that you’re always welcome. In
fact, why don’t you—”

“Tell me who it was that married you. Where’d you
go?”

She said nothing.

“Tell me who married you and Geoff. I have to
know.”

“I don’t know his name. A civil wedding, Ojibway
County. The old guy that runs the hardware store in
Blackstone. Something Gordon, I think.”

“Sweetie, I’ll do what I can. You know that. I’ll do
whatever I have to do.” Gun was fingering the tobacco
papers, but he didn’t roll another cigarette.

“Come out, all right?” Mazy said. “Do that, okay?
And about the land—”

“Forget the land, Mazy. Forget it.”

“I’ve got to go. We’ll talk later. We’re about to have

dinner. Fresh walleye.” She gave a little laugh that
sounded almost cynical.

Gun was silent.

“Dad, I love you.”

“You too,” said Gun. “You know that.”

“Yeah, I do. I’ve got to go now, okay?”

“Good-bye, Mazy. Don’t worry now, all right?”

“‘Bye now.”

“I said
all right?”

She hung up.

He knew it wasn’t any use but he made the call
anyway. Zeke Gordon was pushing ninety, white
cataracts on both eyes, the sort of man whose proxim
ity to the next world puts soft colors on the present one. Every time Gun had seen him, the man was
shedding happy tears about something. New kittens in
the alley, bratty children playing in the street, the
most recent couple he had joined together in holy
matrimony back in the nail section of his hardware
store on Saturday night.

Gordon sputtered through his gums, snapped his teeth into his mouth, and proceeded to carry on,
congratulatory, weepy. Gun’s pretty daughter had
gotten married. Gun hung up on him.

A fresh box of baseballs had arrived yesterday from
the store in Minneapolis, the first of a dozen sporting
goods stores Gun had purchased after retiring. Gun
went into his bedroom, fished out the box from under
the bed, grabbed his bat from behind the bedroom
door and went outside to load the pitching machine.

He couldn’t remember being any better. His eyes
were working so well he was able through concentra
tion to make each pitch appear to slow down. He
could see the red seams revolving, and merely had to
put the meaty part of the bat on the ball. He took twenty swings and hit twelve baseballs out into the

water, home runs. He lined seven into trees, and
fouled off just one. The last pitch he sent deep to
center field, and the ball hit a dead limb thick as a
man’s arm near the top of an old pine. The limb broke
free at the trunk, toppled down and landed at the water’s edge. The ball continued on.