All That I Have (14 page)

NEGATIVE

Well, he made it, but not by much. Three more minutes, and he would have been too late. Three more minutes, and we would have been into a different kind of game, here.

Tuesday night about ten, I got a mobile call from Trooper Timberlake. He was en route to Sean’s parents’ place in Afton. Sean was there. He was loading up his truck, getting ready to take off, it looked like. Melrose Tidd had called the state police barracks to turn Sean in. He hadn’t called the sheriff’s department. The state police dispatcher was putting it out on all bands, though, because Deputy Keen had advised that Sean was wanted for questioning in connection with the shooting in Monterey. Therefore, if you were any kind of peace officer at all, if you had a badge out of a Corn Flakes box, you were on your way to Afton.

I punched it and got there in twenty minutes. Trooper Timberlake was sitting in his patrol car in the dark beside the road at the bottom of Melrose and Ellen’s driveway. Nobody else had showed up, not yet.

Timberlake didn’t leave his patrol car. I parked the truck behind him and went to his window.

“Is he still here?” I asked Timberlake.

“And a good evening to you, too, Sheriff,” said Timberlake. “That’s affirmative. He’s there. He’s in the garage. Him and his mom, both.”

“Where is everybody?” I asked. “I thought the place would be crawling.”

“It will be,” said Timberlake. “But it seems as though the dispatch said
Grafton,
not
Afton,
so some of them had to turn around. They’re straight now, though. They’ll be here directly.”

“Grafton?”

“That’s affirmative, Sheriff.”

“That ain’t even in the county.”

“That’s affirmative, Sheriff,” said Timberlake. “Honest mistake. Happen to anybody. How do you want to do this, here?”

“I want to talk to them alone, before the army, navy, air force, and marines get here,” I said. “Can you handle that?”

“I can handle it for about three minutes. That’s how long you’ve got, more or less.”

“I’m obliged,” I told Timberlake.

“It’s your show, Sheriff,” said Timberlake. “Call me if you need me. I’ll be right here.”

“Thanks, Trooper.”

“I’ll be right here, studying up on my Russian,” said Timberlake.

Some of these young hotshots are trying to develop a sense of humor, it looked like, and that’s good to see, but I didn’t have time to appreciate it right then. I walked up the driveway to the garage. The lights were on inside, and the door was open. I could see Sean putting boxes and bags into the rear of his truck. Ellen was sitting on a kitchen chair watching him. She had a paper tissue balled up in her hand, and she touched her eyes with it from time to time. When I stood in the door of the garage, she left her chair and came to me.

“What do you want, Sheriff?” she asked me. “What do you want with us?”

“You know what I want,” I said. I nodded at Sean.

“He’s leaving, Sheriff,” said Ellen. “He’s going away. Are you here to stop him?”

“I won’t have to stop him in a couple of minutes,” I said. “Half the law in the county’s on its way here. They’ll stop him.”

Sean slammed shut the tailgate of his truck and came to stand behind Ellen.

“I’m out of here,” he said. “All I need is five minutes to go over and tear the lungs out of that fucker Melrose.”

“Sean . . . ,”said Ellen.

“You ain’t got five minutes,” I told Sean. “If you’re going, go now.”

“I’m going,” said Sean. “I got some people to see first.”

“I bet you do,” I said. “Go ahead. See them. Long as they ain’t here. Long as you ain’t here. You’re all done here.”

“You fucking got that right,” said Sean. “There’s fucking nothing here, never has been.”

“Sean . . . ,” said Ellen.

“That’s the way we like it,” I said.

“Ahh, fuck it,” said Sean. But he was going. Did he take time to say goodbye to his mother, to give her a hug? Did he offer to shake my hand, or even turn to look at me? Not Superboy. He got in the truck, started the engine, and rolled out of the garage and down the driveway without lights. He passed Trooper Timberlake’s patrol car, but Timberlake stayed in the vehicle. In the road, Sean switched on his lights and drove off.

“Well, Sheriff,” said Ellen, “you’ve done it. I hope you’re happy. You’ve been down on that boy all his life, you’ve never given him a break, and now you’ve finally driven him from his home. I hope you’re happy now.”

I didn’t answer her. I was waiting for the others to begin turning up.

“That boy has never been given a break of any kind, by anybody,” said Ellen. She shook her head; she touched her damp tissue to her eyes.

“Some people would say different,” I said. “Where’s Melrose?”

“He’s in the house,” Ellen said. “This doesn’t concern him.”

Melrose was going to be sleeping on the couch tonight, it looked like.

“Here they come,” I said.

From the door of Melrose and Ellen’s garage you could see up and down the road for a quarter mile each way. Now from both directions came blue lights, yellow lights, red lights — the whole Christmas tree. Trooper Timberlake saw them too. He got out of his patrol car, put his state trooper hat carefully on his head, and came up the driveway to stand with Ellen and me in the garage.

First man on deck was Deputy Keen. No surprise there. He came fast from the left, overshot the driveway, braked hard, skidded, reversed at speed, and came up the driveway backward, spitting gravel. Lyle threw his door open, left his patrol car, and came toward the three of us with his sidearm out and ready for business, held in both hands, pointed away but not far away. When he got close enough to see us in the dark, “Sheriff?” he said.

“Put up your weapon, Deputy,” I said. “We’re secure here.”

“Where’s Superboy?”

“He don’t appear to be on the premises,” I said.

“The hell he don’t,” said Deputy Keen. “His dad called it in. He’s here. We can take him.”

“That wasn’t his dad,” said Ellen. “That was my husband, Melrose.”

Lyle looked from one to another of us. His mouth was hanging open. He was breathing hard. He still held his pistol two-handed, but now he had it pointed to the ground at his feet.

“His dad’s dead,” said Ellen.

“War hero,” said Trooper Timberlake. How did he know about that?

“So what?” Deputy Keen said. “He’s here. He was here.”

“Maybe,” I said. “He ain’t now. Put it up.”

“If he ain’t, it’s because you let him walk,” said Lyle. He put his gun away. “You let him walk, because you either can’t or won’t do your job. Can’t or won’t. Which is it?”

“You might want to go a little slow, here, Deputy,” said Trooper Timberlake. “You’re talking to your boss.”

“My boss,” said Deputy Keen. He practically spat it. He turned on Timberlake. “You were here,” Lyle said. “You know what happened. You’re in it, too. He let him walk. He let Superboy walk away. He was here, Superboy. You know he was.”

Timberlake didn’t answer him. He looked at Lyle from under his broad, flat-brimmed trooper hat. Timberlake’s a good deal bigger and taller than Lyle. He had five inches to look down at the deputy, and he used all five of them.

“You saw him, didn’t you?” Lyle demanded.

Timberlake looked at him.

“Didn’t you?” Lyle was practically shouting now.

“Negative,” said Trooper Timberlake.

13

SIX RIGS AT THE ETHAN ALLEN

Six vehicles were in the parking lot of the Ethan Allen Motel when I drove in. I looked for the big Mercedes that Logan Tracy rode in, but it wasn’t there.

Six rigs.

Tracy had called that Tuesday, in the afternoon before Sean had taken off. He wanted to meet — it was important. I told him, okay, I could be at the Russians’ place up on the mountain in an hour.

“No,” said Tracy. “Not the house. I’m in the city. I’ll be up there tonight late. I’ll meet you someplace else tomorrow. Someplace quiet. Someplace private. Nowhere near the house.”

I told him about the Ethan Allen, a big old place on Route 10, right at the county line. It had the reputation of being what they used to call a No-Tell Motel, but it was easy to find. Tracy was driving up from New York that night, he said. I met him about ten the next morning.

Six rigs in the lot at the Ethan Allen.

The Mercedes wasn’t there, and neither was Tracy’s slab of a driver, unless he was in the motel. He wasn’t. I found Tracy’s room, knocked on the door. Tracy opened the door a crack and peeked out, saw me, and practically pulled me off my feet into the room. He shut the door and locked it. Inside all the curtains were drawn.

“Sheriff, you have got to find that kid,” Tracy started right in.

“Good morning, Mr. Tracy,” I said.

“This is not a game, Sheriff,” Tracy went on. “You have got to get that safe. I don’t mean soon. I mean now.”

“Nice to see you again, too, Mr. Tracy.”

“Don’t try to smoke me, Jack,” said Tracy. “You’ve got as much exposure in this thing as I have.”

“Then how come I ain’t soiling my britches, like you?” I asked him.

Tracy turned red. I thought for a second he was going to jump me. But then he shook his head. He held up his hand toward me. He nodded. He sat down on the bed.

“Start again,” said Tracy.

“Good idea,” I said. I waited for him to go on.

Six rigs in that lot.

Tracy rubbed both his hands over his face, roughly, like he was trying to keep himself awake. His eyes were red, and they flew around the room, up, down, and into the corners, like little red birds, trapped. I sat on the room’s other bed, facing him. Our knees almost touched between the beds.

Six rigs.

“These are not patient people, Sheriff,” Tracy said.

I nodded.

“They send their guys up here after your friend Sean Duke,” he said, “and they don’t find him, or he gets by them. So what? Do you think they’re going to quit? Do you think they’re going to say, ‘Oh, okay, you win?’ ”

“I thought you didn’t know nothing about that. You said you didn’t.”

“Come on, Sheriff,” said Tracy. “What do you want me to say, here? Yes, I know about the people they sent. I also know they’ll send more. They sent one, then two. They’ll send five, ten, as many as it takes until they find him.”

I nodded. Six rigs out front of the Ethan Allen. That’s a funny word, ain’t it:
rig
?

“They won’t stop there, either,” Tracy went on. “They’ll go to people they think can help them find him. They’ll go to those people’s families. There’s nothing they won’t do. They will go after — Sheriff, they will destroy — anybody who gets in their way, anybody who doesn’t help them get what they want. That includes you, Sheriff.”

“It includes you, too, don’t it?”

“Why do you think I’m here?”

“What’s in their strongbox?” I asked Tracy.

“I don’t know.”

“Who’s the fellow was up at the house the other day? Hair slicked down. Didn’t have a lot to say for himself. Who’s he?”

“I don’t know.”

“You talk to him, don’t you?”

“As little as possible.”

“But some. What do you call him?”

“Mr. Smith. I call him Mr. Smith. Help me, Sheriff. Tell me you’ll find that kid before they do. For his sake, for yours. For mine.”

“I don’t see what you’ve got to be worried about,” I told him. “You’re their insurance man, ain’t you?”

“I’m not performing,” said Tracy. “What they want to happen isn’t happening. I’m not making it happen. Sheriff? Are you listening, Sheriff?”

Rig. It’s an old-fashioned word, ain’t it? It means something more like a buggy or a carriage, a horse-drawn outfit, than an outfit with a motor to it. But we call a car or a truck a rig. Six rigs. Six rigs in the lot out there, right now. The people who drove them here were in these rooms, right here, separated by these thin Sheetrock walls, doing what the Ethan Allen was set up to have them do. They were doing it right now.

“Sheriff? Are you hearing me, Sheriff?”

“Say what?”

“There was a guy, my predecessor,” said Tracy. “At a firm in the city. He handled things for them.”

“For Mr. Smith?”

“That’s right,” said Tracy. “Something got fouled up, some arrangement they had — I don’t know the details. Something they didn’t feel went right, on my predecessor’s watch. You understand?”