Mudlark (11 page)

"I want to talk to Tom Lindquist."

"Really, Mr. Hagen--"

"Lark--"

"You dirty half-breed!"

"He isn't--" I was about to explain that Tom wasn't home, but the man drew a handgun from the pocket
of his jacket. Jay was halfway down the stairs.

"Hey!" I yelped.

Hagen's chiseled features registered no known emotion. "Think you can kill my wife, you bastard? I'll
show you--" He raised the gun.

Instinct took over. I swung the sander up, two-handed, aiming for his gun hand. I connected with his
right elbow. The gun fired as it flew out of his hand, the din bouncing off the walls.

Jay leapt down the stairs, and we both fell on Donald Hagen like a tower. We knocked him flat.

Jay twisted the intruder's arm behind his back. "Who the devil--"

"Hagen," I gasped. "Looking for Tom." My head was still ringing from the sound of the gunshot.

Jay gave a sharp jerk on the arm. "What do you want?"

The man groaned. "Fuck you, Lindquist."

Jay straddled Hagen, keeping the arm pinned. "You're off-base, buddy. I'm not Tom Lindquist, and
you're under arrest. You have the right to remain silent--"

I couldn't believe Jay was Mirandizing Hagen there before my very eyes, but he finished the whole
warning, word perfect, and I added, "Any comment?"

"Lindquist killed my wife."

"I doubt it." Jay gave another jerk.

Hagen moaned again.

Plaster was still sifting down. "He knocked a hole in the ceiling!"

I heard a thud upstairs. Freddy. I swallowed a giggle.

"Go call 911, Lark," Jay instructed, irritation sharpening his voice.

I abandoned the sander where it lay and ducked into the kitchen. The dispatcher didn't understand me
until I calmed down enough to speak coherently. She assured me help was coming. I went back into the hall.

Jay still held Hagen's arm in a twist and was frisking him, one-handed. Jay does not like being shot at. I
didn't envy Hagen. On the other hand, I didn't feel sorry for him either. I watched with interest as he squirmed and
protested.

The gun had come to rest by the archway that led into the dining room. I despise guns. I nosed the
weapon the rest of the way around the corner with the toe of my sneaker. The air reeked of cordite. "Shall I go find
your handcuffs?"

Jay grunted. He kept a pair of handcuffs in his briefcase, God knows why, so the question wasn't entirely
idiotic. He had a knee in Hagen's back, the arm in a lock, and was thumbing, left-handed through the man's wallet.
"Donald C. Hagen, The Hagen Group, San Francisco. No shit."

Hagen was saying something about his lawyer.

"Wait till your fancy corporation hears from
my
lawyer," Jay snarled. "What do you use for
brains, Hagen, tofu?"

The bell rang.

I sidled over to the door and peered out the little glass window alongside it, which I should have done
when Hagen rang, though the sight of him wouldn't have stopped me from opening the door. I don't know what I
expected to see. Corporate goons? A middle-aged man in a gray three-piecer and Lee Iacocca glasses stood on the
porch, wringing his hands.

I opened the door. "Yes?"

"Is Mr... Oh, no." He stared past me, eyes bulging behind the spectacles. "Oh, dear, what have you done,
sir?"

"Who are you?"

"Uh, I beg your pardon, madam, I'm Clinton Walls. I'm the Pacific Northwest vice-president of the Hagen
Group. Mr. Hagen, he... Oh, dear."

"He just tried to kill my husband." I had gone from adrenal surge to wrath. "Is that how you people do
business?"

"Oh, dear, I'm sorry, madam, believe me. He's distraught. I heard the gunshot. Did he hurt--" He was
trying to see past me and took a step forward.

"If you knew he was armed, Mr. Walls, you're an accessory. Step back onto the porch, if you
please."

Behind me I heard Freddy thudding down the stairs, questions rattling out in his light tenor.

I met Walls's worried eyes. "Out, Mr. Walls. We are going to stand on the porch together and wait for
the police."

Walls made a choking noise, but he did step back. I joined him and pulled the door shut behind me.

"Is anything wrong?" Matt Cramer was edging across the lawn.

"Just a little misunderstanding, Matt. I've called the cops."

"Anything I can do?"

I clenched my teeth on another giggle. "No, thanks. We're fine."

"Lottie really appreciated the flowers." He was coming over to the porch.

Walls looked as if he might burst into tears.

"I thought I heard--"

I said, "It was a gunshot, Matt, but nobody was injured."

Matt was standing on the front walkway, looking up at us. "Oh my, oh my. Who--"

"The shootist claims to be Donald Hagen. He mistook Jay for Tom Lindquist."

Mr. Walls made distraught clucking noises. "Please, madam. I don't think-- I'm sure Mr. Hagen
won't--"

I said to Matt, "I do hope Lottie's better."

"About the same, about the same. I came home to get her fresh nightclothes. Who's that?"

I introduced Walls to Matt, wondering how Eugene Ionescu would have dealt with our dialogue. A siren
yelped in the distance.

"I really didn't think he meant to harm anyone," Walls assured Matt. The vice-president was beginning
to regain his composure. And to think about self-preservation.

A sheriff's car rounded the corner and wheeled into our driveway behind an alien BMW that had to
belong to Hagen. I wondered if he kept fresh BMWs at every construction site.

Dale Nelson jumped out and ran toward us, hand on the butt of his gun. This time he had backup.
Another deputy, older and fatter, got out, too, stood on the far side of the cop car, and aimed his gun at us,
two-handed, over the roof.

Lest they imagine Walls was the culprit, I said hastily, "Jay's inside with Hagen."

Nelson gained the porch. "Is he armed?"

"Hagen? Not anymore. He fired one shot."

Nelson jerked his head at the other deputy. The gun disappeared.

I opened the door. Jay was still sitting on his assailant, and Freddy was watching both men from the
stairway, one hand on the newel, his eyes bright with excitement.

I ushered Nelson and the fat deputy in. Walls and Matt tried to follow, but I shut them out.

Nelson had Hagen handcuffed and sitting in the back of the sheriff's car within five minutes, in spite of
Walls's anguished protests. Hagen was sputtering threats by that time and red in the face, whether from anger or
embarrassment it was impossible to say. I wondered if he was on something, coke perhaps. The fat deputy stayed
by the car to keep an eye on him, and Nelson returned with us to the house.

I showed Nelson the gun and let Jay do the explaining, which saved time. They said the weapon was a
.38, but even I could see it was no Saturday night special. Hagen's initials were engraved on the butt.

Waiting for the evidence team to show up consumed a good hour. They had to drive over from the
county seat, which was forty miles away on the east side of the bay. Well before they came, a local car appeared,
and Nelson sent the prisoner off to be booked. Then Nelson took our statements.

Walls hung around in the BMW. He was making calls on a cellular phone, so it was probable that
Hagen's attorney would meet his client at the courthouse. By the time the evidence team came, children from the
mobile homes on the flat had spotted the excitement. They flocked around Walls's car and watched him telephone.
Their parents gathered in knots down the road, or across it in the dunes. Bonnie drove up and stood on her porch
watching, and Matt joined her. Finally, Tom Lindquist also appeared.

The deputy in charge outside wouldn't let Tom come in at first, or so Tom said when he did enter via
the back door and the utility room. He was appalled when he heard what had happened and offered to move out
immediately, but Jay was having none of that. Jay was angrier than I've seen him in a long time, though he was
concealing it well. I suppose Nelson and the technical people saw a cool, critical professional. I saw a volcano. I
waited for the eruption.

The telephone kept ringing--Tom's craftsmen returning his calls and one enterprising reporter. Tom
spoke with the craftsmen and hung up on the reporter. Once Freddy figured out that the exciting part was over, he
went back upstairs to work on the computer. I made crab sandwiches.

The cops finally left after marking up my floors and walls, covering various surfaces with fingerprint
powder for no apparent reason, and measuring trajectories. They pried the slug, intact, from the ceiling, and of
course they photographed everything. We were lucky the bullet hadn't fragmented or ricocheted, so I tried to be
philosophical about the hole in the plaster.

When we had seen Nelson off, Jay turned on me. "What the hell do you mean, letting that freak in the
front door?"

I held onto my temper. "Is that any way to talk to the woman who just saved your life? I didn't let him
in, Jay. He shoved his way in."

"But--"

"You're upset. I understand. So am I, but don't take it out on me. Go for a run."

His mustache whiffled.

I touched his arm. The muscles were tight as cable. "A long run."

He drew an uneven breath and wrapped both arms around me. "He was down there with you. I
thought--"

I hugged back. "Never mind. It's over."

Eventually Jay took my advice and went for a run. I drifted back to the kitchen where Freddy was
consuming crab sandwiches and telling Tom about the state of the computer. Disassembled, from the sound of it.
The phone rang again and Tom answered. "For you, Lark." He held out the receiver.

I said hello.

A female voice I didn't recognize said, "Hi, Lark. I hear you had a little excitement over there."

That was one way of putting it. I almost hung up.

The woman went on in a cheery, oblivious voice, "This is Jean Knight. Are we still on for Labor
Day?"

Labor Day. Good God, I had forgotten that we were set to entertain the Knights. "Uh, yes, as far as I
know. The weather--"

Jean laughed. "It's nice today, so it'll probably be miserable by Monday. If you're set on a
barbecue--"

"Well, I thought I'd do salmon. I can roast it in the oven, if need be. I warn you the house looks like a
hurricane struck it." I described the denuding of the living room.

"It'll look great when you're done. Is Lindquist actually staying with you?"

"Yes. I expect we'll have Tom and Bonnie Bell, our neighbor across the street, as well as you two and
Freddy. Possibly Freddy's girlfriend."

"That sounds like a crowd. I was going to ask if I could bring Annie McKay, too, but--"

"The editor?"

"Yes. She and I work for the Nature Conservancy. When I mentioned I knew you, she said she'd like to
meet you."

I had the feeling Annie McKay's interest in us was motivated by curiosity about the biggest news story
on the peninsula. I hesitated, but I was fairly curious myself, so I said, "Sure. The more the merrier."

"If Annie's husband, Bob, is in town, I imagine he'll want to come too."

I wondered if we had enough chairs. "That's okay."

"Great. I'll bring the dessert. Anything else I can do?"

"Dessert will be extremely helpful."

"What time?"

"Around five, I thought. See you then."

We hung up simultaneously. "Whew," I said. "Is it okay with you if I activate the answering machine,
Tom?"

"Sure. I have the workmen pretty well lined up."

I explained about the Labor Day fest. Tom said he had been planning to go out on a boat, but he
supposed he'd have to cancel that anyway. He thanked me for the invitation and offered me a frozen salmon. I
accepted. Freddy promised to invite Darla.

I looked at Tom. "You know Annie McKay, don't you?"

"Went to high school with her."

"Good. She's coming."

His face took on a strange expression. "Have you read
Small
Victories
?"

"Oh, no. The Prom Queen?" The Prom Queen was the object of the teenaged protagonist's hopeless
infatuation.

Tom nodded. "Maybe I should go fishing."

"Not on your life, sir." I felt the bubble of laughter I had been suppressing rise in my throat. "Not on
your life." I was beginning to sound like Matt Cramer.

My amusement evaporated as soon as I took a deep breath. I had ten people coming for dinner on Labor
Day, and it was already Thursday. Ten people and eight dining room chairs. I could put half of us in the dining room
and half in the nook...no.

"What's wrong, Lark?" Freddy took a slurp of Coke. Tom frowned.

I opened my mouth to say "Nothing," but a commotion from the front of the house distracted me. Tom
stood up.

I heard Jay, and Bonnie's lighter voice responding to him, and I shook my head.

Tom sank back on his chair. "I could get jumpy hanging around here."

Freddy laughed. I didn't. I hadn't realized I was jumpy, but I was as twitchy as Bonnie's cat.

Jay swung the door open and Bonnie preceded him, carrying a ceramic casserole dish. "Scalloped
oysters for dinner," she said. "What's the matter, Lark?"

Jay was watching me, too. "Something wrong?"

I burst into tears.

I hate it when I do that. Even as I blubbered, I knew I was just reacting to too much adrenaline. I have
always been far more apprehensive about social crises than about physical danger. I could tell myself I was foolish
to disarm a maniac with one cool sweep of my sander, then fall to bits because a couple of strangers were coming
to dinner, but I can't help being that kind of fool.

Though my little nerve-storm blew over almost at once, it lasted long enough for Freddy and Tom to
disappear. Jay patted me. Bonnie murmured soothing phrases as she set her dish on the counter. I leaned against
Jay's sweat-soaked jersey and hiccupped out an account of my disastrous dinner plans.