Fools Rush In (The Sam McCain Mysteries Book 7) (18 page)

But there was certainly a way the photos could be used privately. This particular tactic had been used before. Opponent takes photos to the senator and demands that the senator withdraw, otherwise the photos will be circulated privately to reporters.

Some people can tolerate scandal. They can go before their public and apologize with wife and children by their side and go on from there. But there are those who can’t, those who are willing to give up the power that comes with a Senate seat, rather than face a scandal-hungry press that will likely not let go of the subject for some time.

What the hell was going on here?

I ate—don’t ask me why in the Edward Hopper diner. Slice of peach pie, cup of coffee. As usual, the place was mostly empty. I was all things at once—tired, restless, angry, baffled.

I’d brought along my nickel notebook to make out the list I probably should have made out forty-eight hours ago.

Rob Anderson

Nick Hannity

Lucy Williams

Senator Williams

Will Neville

James Neville

Those were the primary suspects. The Neville brothers had to be included because they had a good reason to kill their little brother—to take over his blackmail business and find the cash he’d already amassed.

I also needed to make a separate list of those he’d been blackmailing, the names on the manila envelopes I’d handed out tonight. Last names only. I’d been able to guess correctly which family member bearing the name was being blackmailed. Logic and familiarity dictated a husband in one case and a wife in another, whereas the third had been determined by my favorite scientific method, the lucky guess.

“Your handwriting is worse than mine.”

She slipped onto the counter stool next to me. Her perfume set off an alarm in my trousers.

“It was good enough for the nuns,” I said.

“The nuns always gave boys the benefit of the doubt.”

“That’s not true.”

“Sure it is. Think back. I went to Catholic school, too.”

“Since when are Sykeses Catholics?”

“My dad saw this movie when he was in Italy during the war. You know, one of those corny things where there’s a miracle in the end?”

“I always hated those movies. They always embarrassed me.”

“Me, too. But they didn’t embarrass my dad. He wrote my mom that he wanted all of us baptized Catholic right away. He’d already been baptized. So, anyway, after seventh grade, I went to Catholic school. And the nuns preferred the boys.”

I saw her looking at the list on my notebook page. I flipped the cover closed.

“I already saw it. I do the same. Make out a list of suspects.”

The night man came and took her order for coffee and a piece of buttered toast.

“So how’d it go with Rob Anderson?”

“He now has a lawyer, and a damn good one. Frank Pierson. Des Moines.”

“Yeah, he is good.”

“Pierson allowed us half an hour and he did most of the talking. Anderson just sat there and smirked. God, he’s a jerk.”

“You ask him about the tar baby?”

“Of course. Pierson answered that one, too, and said that it was just a prank and that it hadn’t even been constructed.”

“Because he couldn’t find anybody who’d do it for him.”

“According to Pierson, even if it
had
been built, it wouldn’t have any bearing on the case.”

“I’d like to hear him try that one in court. You could take him apart with it.”

“I did. In fact, that was the only point I scored. I said it spoke to state of mind and to motive—how much he hated Leeds.”

“What’d Pierson say?”

“Said it was tangential and a waste of time.”

“So I don’t suppose you learned anything new?”

Her coffee and toast came. She ate fast. “Haven’t had anything since lunch.” Then she turned to me and said, “Even if I did learn something new, I can’t share it with you, Sam. Remember?”

“Oh, right.”

“So it’s no fair asking me. I wouldn’t want to damage our relationship.”

“Some relationship.”

She swallowed the last of her toast. “You know your problem?”

“No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“You love being in love. A lot of people are like that. And it’s fun. In the beginning, anyway. It’s like you’re high all the time. Everything is new and exciting—even though you’ve been through it with a number of people before—and it’s like you’re living in this state of grace. And that’s what you’re after.”

“I probably am. So what’s so wrong about that?”

“Nothing at all, Sam. I love that feeling, too. But I’ve been through too many ups and downs with men. For once in my life, I want to take my time. And you don’t. You want the exhilaration immediately. Two dates and we’re sleeping together and living in this Technicolor romance. And then in six or seven months it all falls apart.”

I gave it some honest thought. Because the night man was listening so carefully, I almost asked him what
he
thought. Maybe we could have a vote and he’d be the tie-breaker.

“I’ll tell you what. I think after the big heartbreak of my life—a beautiful girl named Pamela Forrest—I think I probably was like that. But I don’t think I’m like that anymore.”

“You know what, Sam?” She rested her hand on my arm. “I was sort of the same way. Rush into things and then watch it all fall apart. So why don’t we make a pact?” She glanced up at the night man. “How does that sound, sir? A pact?”

He smiled, wiped his hands on his grease-spotted apron. “I get up late in the mornings and my old lady always has soap operas on. This is just like one of those. A pact sounds great.”

“Do I get to know what this pact is all about?”

“Why don’t I tell you outside? We have some business to discuss, anyway.”

As we were leaving, the night man said, “Stop back, you two, so I know how it works out.”

We all laughed.

“were you ever in that little wading pool over there, Sam?”

“Oh, sure.”

“I’ll bet you were cute.”

“Skinny, that’s for sure.”

“I can picture you, actually.”

We were sitting on the steps of the bandstand in the middle of the town square.

“So how about that pact, laddie?”

“Laddie?”

“I heard Maureen O’Hara say that on the late movie last night. If it’s good enough for Maureen, it’s good enough for me.”

“Yeah, I mean, sure, the pact I mean. Slow and easy.”

She put out her hand and we shook. We sat silent in the darkness then, watching a lonely dog sniff around the grounds and the teenagers roar by in their custom cars, radios blaring, Roy Orbison and Jan & Dean and Lesley Gore providing the soundtracks for all those high school lives that would make sense only years later to those who had lived them.

“Did you used to drive up and down the street like they do?”

“Sure.”

“Did the beautiful Pamela Forrest ever go with you?”

“Sometimes, when she was mad at tall, dark, handsome, and very rich Stu.”

“Her boyfriend?”

“Up several notches. Her god.”

“I had one of those in high school. My girlfriends always said that when he was looking into my eyes, he was actually looking at his own reflection.”

I smiled. “Maybe sadomasochism is the essence of all romantic love.”

“As long as I get the ‘sadist’ part, I’ll be happy.” Then: “You ready for some business talk?”

“Sure. Because ‘laddie’ here is getting a little chilly.”

“C’mon, then, you can walk me back to my hotel and we can talk along the way.”

And talk we did.

“Did you talk to the judge today?”

“No. I tried to get in to see her but she still doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“She’s going to the clinic in Minnesota.”

“Yes. I’ll drive her if she wants me to.”

“I know how much you care about her. But since she’s going there, it seems to me that we can go on with our original plan and work together.”

“I’ve been thinking about that, too.”

“Good. Have you also been thinking about who might have killed Leeds and Neville?”

“I keep going back and forth between Anderson and Hannity.”

“So do I, actually. But I’m not one hundred percent sure about either of them. I’ve been thinking about the senator, in fact.”

“The senator. He had the most to lose.”

I’d been wondering if I should tell her about what had happened in my office tonight. I did.

“I didn’t notice any bump on your head.”

“It’s gone down a lot.”

“You don’t think you should have it checked?”

“I’m fine.”

“You know, in private-eye novels they take a lot of punishment. But in real life you can die from something like that.”

“I’m fine. Really.”

We stood a quarter of a block from her hotel, in the shadows of an old movie theater that had closed down.

I put out my hand. “Well, I guess we shake hands good-night, huh?”

“Oh, I think we can do better than that, laddie.”

And we sure as hell did.

T
HE WINDOW WENT JUST
after midnight. Two rocks the size of a heavyweight’s fist, as I learned later.

Sitting up in bed. Real or nightmare, that glass-smashed sound?

The cats weren’t sure, either. Usually they would’ve jumped off the bed. But they were as frozen as I was. Real or nightmare?

The third rock came through the window on the opposite side of the back door.

No doubt about this one.

The cats and I sprang off the bed. I found my slippers, wanting to avoid cutting the hell out of the bottoms of my feet, and rushed to the window for a look.

The backyard, limned by moonlight, shimmered summer-night beautiful in moon shadow and glistening dew. Even the two garbage cans looked like pieces of art in the darkness.

One of them peeked out from the alley side of the garage. Couldn’t be sure but it looked like Hannity. But they would be operating as a team.

They were getting ready for another assault.

During the next three or four minutes I got into my jeans and penny loafers sans socks, then grabbed my dad’s army .45 from the bureau and started my way down the interior steps of the house.

The widow Goldman waited for me at the bottom of the stairs. Even somewhat sleep-mussed, she was still a slightly better-looking version of Lauren Bacall. She had a blue silk robe drawn tight up to her neck. Everybody should have such a landlady, though that seemed too coarse a word for someone as stylish, bright, and gentle as Mrs. Goldman.

“Are you all right?”

“Fine.”

“Let me call the police.”

“No. Please don’t.”

“Good Lord, Sam. That’s a gun in your hand.”

“My dad’s from the war.”

“Please, Sam. Let me call the police. Let them settle this. In fact, why don’t you stay down here with me. That way I know you won’t do anything crazy.”

“I know who it is, Mrs. Goldman. I can handle it.”

“With a gun?”

“Just for show. Honest.”

“Good Lord, Sam. A gun?”

“I’ll stop by when I’m done with this.”

Just then another window shattered upstairs.

“I’ll make sure they pay for every one of them, Mrs. Goldman.”

“Sam, it’s you I’m worried about. Not somebody paying for the windows.”

I didn’t want to miss them. I opened the front door and said, “I’ll be right back.”

The night was exhilarating, rich in scents of newly mown grass, loam, the wood of respectable old houses, and the cool air of the prairie.

I swung wide, running quickly up the street, then darting between houses and out to the alley.

I stood in the shadow of a garage overhang, watching them. They were gathering rocks for their next assault. Rob Anderson and Nick Hannity. America’s youth.

I didn’t have to worry about them seeing me. They were too drunk to see past their own hands.

I stayed in the shadows and started moving slowly down the alley. Anderson glanced up once. I thought he might have seen me. But I ducked behind a pile of fireplace logs and stayed there for a few minutes. If he’d seen me, he’d quickly forgotten about it.

I waited until their backs were turned away from me, until they were taking position to start throwing again. They were going to run out of windows soon.

“Drop the rocks. And hands up in the air.”

Hannity started to twist around, but then I stepped into the moonlight and gave him a peek at my .45.

“Shit, man, what’s the gun for?”

“Because I’m taking you in.”

“It was Rob’s idea, man. Not mine.”

Now Rob turned around to face me. “That’s bullshit. This was your idea, you jerk.”

“Doesn’t matter whose idea it was. You both smashed out windows. You both broke the law.”

“My folks are gonna be so pissed it’s unbelievable,” Anderson said. His voice sounded reasonably sober. But the way he kept jerking around, trying to stay in one place without simply falling over, gave him away.

“Which one of you killed Leeds and Neville?”

“He did, man,” Anderson said. “I was at a movie and I can prove it. He did. He was afraid Nancy Adams was going to sleep with the Negro.”

“You lying bastard. You were afraid Lucy was gonna sleep with him!”

In their white T-shirts and jeans, they looked young and harmless. But there was a good chance they weren’t harmless at all. There were a lot of racists in this country, but when you added the scorn of the upper classes to the scorn of race, you had a real monster.

“Step up here, Anderson.”

“Why should I, you bastard? You don’t mean shit to me.”

“Because I’m going to cuff you.”

“Handcuffs?”

“That’s right.” I’d brought two pairs, just in case. “Turn around. Hands behind your back.”

I kicked him hard in the shin. He called me several names, at least two of which I’d never heard before. Every time he tried to move on me I shoved the .45 in his face. He still hadn’t turned around.

Another shin kick worked wonders.

He turned around. He was crying. Unfortunately my pity function seemed to be turned off.

Hannity, being Hannity, had lunged at me twice while I was cuffing Anderson. Both times I’d shouted at him close up and put the gun in his face. He’d stepped back. I think the shout bothered him more than the gun.