Past Crimes (3 page)

What if this was the last of it for the old man? What if he didn’t open his eyes and tell me who’d shot him?

What if I never learned why?

The curb in front of the house was empty again, and I parked the Charger and went up the stone steps to the porch. I stopped at the door. The forensic crew had attached a padlock to the jamb. They hadn’t wanted to use the regular lock, in case they needed access again.

I stared at the padlock for a moment. Then I raised my boot and stomped the door above the knob. The wood cracked and bent, but the lock held. I reared back and kicked it again, harder. Splinters exploded from the jamb as the padlock and hasp flew through the swinging door.

Yellow crime-scene tape was stretched wide over the entrance to the front room. Ivory fingerprint dust was everywhere. And red across the floor, like a demon’s blanket.

The rest of the room looked pretty much as I remembered it. Overstuffed bookshelves. Lamps made of heavy brass. The same old painting
of the rocky landscape of County Clare hanging above the mantel of the fireplace. The television was newer, a flat-screen plasma, but sitting on the same built-in cabinet where the old one had been. Dono’s leather chair was also in the same spot. The old man spent most of his time in this room.
Had
spent.

I walked down the hall and into the kitchen. Dono had always kept his liquor in the cabinet above the refrigerator. He still did. I grabbed the first bottle I saw, Kentucky bourbon, and took a long pull from it. Then another. It helped my mood about as much as pissing on a bonfire.

I threw the bottle across the room, and it shattered against the counter. That was more like it. I snatched up one of the wooden chairs and smashed it down on the breakfast table, once, twice. Music. On the third swing, the chair fell to pieces, and I threw the fragments aside.

I was looking around for something else to break when someone knocked on the open front door.

O
VER THE POUNDING IN
my ears, I heard another knock. A dog started barking. A big dog, from the low rumbling sound of it.

“Hey,” a woman’s voice called. “Everything all right in there?”

I took a couple of long, slow breaths to steady my pulse before I left the kitchen. My boots made wet bourbon footprints on the hardwood of the hall.

A woman stood in the open doorway, only half visible in the ambient light coming from the back of the house. She was old, as short and stout as a mailbox, with spiky white hair. The dog was white, too. Some sort of mutt, maybe pit bull and water buffalo.

I stopped in the hall, well away from the door and the dog. It barked again at me and shifted its muscular weight onto its front paws, straining at the leash.

“Stanley,” the woman said to the dog. It stopped barking but whined and tugged to be free. I wasn’t sure if it wanted to play or to eat me. The woman leaned back to hold the animal in place. In her other hand, she carried a baking tray covered in Saran Wrap.

“Help you?” I said.

“You must be the grandson,” she said. “I’m Addy Proctor.” She didn’t sound alarmed, even though I was still wearing Dono’s old barn jacket, with no shirt and bloodstained jeans. The dog growled.

“You one of Dono’s neighbors, Ms. Proctor?” If she knew I was related to Dono, she must have heard it from the cops at some point this morning. She’d probably seen the whole show, complete with lights and sirens.

“Addy,” she corrected. “I’m down the street, in the bright yellow house.”

I remembered the place, from my walk up the block when I’d first arrived. The image stuck because of the big blue
NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH
sign on her lawn.

She hefted the baking tray. “I’ve brought you something.”

I was too damn tired to entertain the local snoop. I reached over to flip on the hallway light. She wore an ivory cable-knit turtleneck sweater and black pants, with clunky slip-on black shoes. Thick black glasses with square frames. I put her age somewhere north of seventy.

“That’s real nice of you, but—”

“It’s no trouble,” she said. “Hot-link casserole. Hope you eat meat.”

“It’s just that—”

“I’ll pop it in the oven. Is the kitchen back here?” And she marched in, dog leading the way. I had no choice but to retreat. We made a clumsy parade, me shuffling backward and Stanley barking eagerly.

In the kitchen, shards from the bottle of bourbon covered half the tiled floor. The fumes stung my nostrils. Stanley snuffed in protest. Pieces of the broken chair were strewn around the room. The breakfast table had fresh gouges exposing raw wood beneath. A glass salt-and-pepper set had fallen off and shattered. The spilled contents soaked up the whiskey.

Addy Proctor took it all in and tugged Stanley back from the broken glass. “Redecorating?” she said.

Christ. If I let the old woman start cleaning, she’d be here all night.

I grabbed a broom from the narrow space between the fridge and the wall and began to sweep the worst of the mess out from underfoot. I’d just reached automatically for where Dono and I had always kept the brooms and mops.

“I’m not up for visitors tonight, Ms.—Addy,” I said.

“No need to entertain me,” she said. “I just saw you come back a few minutes ago and wanted to drop this off for you. And ask how your grandfather is doing.”

Right. Of course. Give her a nugget of gossip to spread around, and she and her dog would be out the door.

“He’s alive,” I said. “But beyond that they don’t know.”

She frowned. “You don’t sound hopeful.”

“His surgeon had a hard time putting a positive spin on it. Nothing to do but wait.”

“Damn,” she said. “The doctors never are encouraging, are they? Just in case they’re proven wrong. They drive you mad.” She watched me dump a dustpan full of glass into the trash. “Is that what all this was about?”

“Yeah.”

She nodded and looped the end of Stanley’s leash around the doorknob. He whined. “Hush,” Addy said. “Sit.
Sit
.” The dog did, reluctantly, and sniffed in the direction of the casserole. Addy opened the oven door and removed the plastic wrap from the tray. “Twenty minutes,” she said, setting the dial.

“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll have some before I sack out.”

“I’ve already done a phone tree.” She straightened up. Her eyes were green and bright behind the mannish black glasses. “Nobody on the block saw anyone around your house this morning. Except me. And I only saw you, when you first arrived.”

“You’re the one who heard the gunshot.”

“I heard something. I was out on my front porch.” She grimaced. “Smoking. I can’t quite seem to give up that first cigarette of the day. Sixty damn years. I wake up earlier and earlier now, and I still can’t beat it.” She shook her head. “I was in my robe, standing just outside my door looking at the fog, and that’s when I heard the … well, I didn’t really know it was a gun. Kind of a snapping sound. Not like on TV.”

“Small caliber.”

“I’ll take your word for it. Guns aren’t my favorite thing in this world. I wasn’t even sure where the sound had come from.”

“But you called the cops.”

“Dono’s house here was the only one with lights on. From my porch you can see up the hill and through your window, just a piece of that room.” She pointed back down the hall.

“The front room.”

“Yes. I looked up here toward the light and saw shadows moving around, moving quickly. And I had a very bad feeling. I told myself that if it turned out to be nothing, I’d feel like a fool, but if it were something serious, then I’d
be
a fool, and that’s much worse. So I picked up the phone.”

“You did right.”

“Still. I wish I’d have walked out and looked. Maybe I’d have seen who did it.”

I wished that, too. That Addy Proctor had rushed recklessly to the scene and gotten a glimpse of the shooter before he went out the back. But what she wanted was reassurance.

“You made the smart choice,” I said. “Dono needed the paramedics more than anything else. All I had was bare hands and a T-shirt.”

Addy exhaled. “Thank you. I’ve been kicking myself all damn day about it. That’s why I’ve been keeping half an eye on your house today. Sometimes you have to do something. Or go nuts.”

I shook my head. “I owe you one, Addy. No. I owe you two.” I went to the other side of the kitchen and brought over a big red leather barstool that Dono had owned since before I was born, and I put it down so she could take a seat. “One for calling for help, fast. It saved Dono’s life. And two for seeing me and telling the cops about it. Otherwise they might have me locked up for Dono’s shooting right now.”

I took two glasses out of the cabinet and used the sink filter to pour water for both of us. There was a loaf of Van de Kamp’s wheat bread on the counter. I opened the plastic bag, balled up a slice of bread, and tossed it on the floor for Stanley. He wolfed it down in two chews.

The chair was too tall for Addy. Her chunky shoes barely touched the metal ring around the legs meant as a footrest. “Do the police have any leads?” she said.

“Not that they’re sharing.” I didn’t think they would find anything at all, not if Guerin and Kanellis stuck to standard operating bullshit. Phone records and last known associates weren’t going to cut it.

“You’re Neighborhood Watch,” I said. “What’s the recent history around here? Any break-ins?”

“There was a burglary a couple of years ago, on the next block over. A few of the usual stereo thefts out of parked cars. Nothing like this,” she said.

“I should let people know what’s happened,” I said. “Did Dono ever mention any friends to you? Maybe a girlfriend?”

She shook her head. “He and I only said hello on the street, that sort of thing. He was pleasant, but … well …”

I nodded understanding. Dono had always kept the neighbors at a cordial but firm distance. On those occasions when some especially sociable people moved onto the block, he would politely decline any invitations to join them for dinner or a beer until they took the hint.

We hadn’t ignored them completely, of course. Dono would run a background check on their names, along with any of their family who lived in the city. He’d try to verify occupations and former addresses. Find out if any of them had arrest records. Just in case the new arrivals turned out to be cops, or were the sort of people who attracted attention from cops. The old man believed that good fences and a traceable history made for good neighbors.

I looked at Addy. What had Dono’s check on her told him?

“Have you lived here long?” I said.

“I moved in three years ago. Magnus and I had owned the house forever. When he passed on … well, it made sense to stop renting it out and just use it myself.” She pointed at my boots. “Are you in the service?”

Apparently we were trading fact for fact. “The army.”

“Magnus was in the army, too. Sweden’s.”

“You see anybody else around here recently? Any visitors?”

She considered it, taking off her glasses and wiping them on her sweater. There was a fine web of lines on her round face.

“I did see someone. A man, and I’d seen him here before. A friend of your grandfather’s?”

“When was this?”

“Most recently? Last week, I think.” She shook her head. “I’m sorry. The days get blended together. I haven’t been retired that long, and it’s like vacation, when you suddenly realize you’ve lost track of what day of the week it is.”

“But about a week ago. There was a man with Dono? What did he look like?”

“Yes. Out at the curb. I was driving past, I remember that now. He was kind of large. Not tall, but barrel-chested?”

“Okay. Keep going.”

“Maybe your grandfather’s age, sixtyish. His hair might have been lighter. Like orange or red.”

A burly redhead. I knew a man like that.

“You said they were at the curb. By Dono’s pickup? Or the other man’s car?”

“Must have been the other fellow’s. I know your grandfather’s big blue truck—it wasn’t that.”

“Was it something like a Caddy? A soft top?”

“Yes. Yes.” She widened her eyes, excited. “Damn if it wasn’t. A big American gas guzzler. With black paint, I think.”

Hollis Brant. He always went for those old boats, with the bench seats that gave his wide frame a little more elbow room.

So Hollis was back in Seattle now. Just like me.

“He’s a friend of Dono’s,” I said to Addy. “I’ll call him.”

“I can’t believe that car of his didn’t come to mind right away. So few convertibles in Seattle.”

I stretched. “It’s been a hell of a day.” How fast could I reach Hollis?

Addy took the hint and put down her half-finished water glass. “I imagine.” She dropped off the high stool. “I’m very sorry about Dono. You’ll let me know what I can do to help.”

It wasn’t a request. I had to smile. “I will.”

“I’m glad you’re here for him. I’ll be back for the dish. Don’t forget
to eat.” She tugged on Stanley’s leash. As he passed me, he nosed my hand with his huge head, looking to get his ears scratched or maybe just hoping for another piece of bread. They went down the hallway and out the open door. After a moment I followed. I could hear Addy’s shoes thunking against the pavement as she made her steady way down the hill. Odd old bird.

MY GRANDFATHER HAD MADE
a few changes on the second floor. The master bath had been remodeled, and there was new carpeting in the same shade of dusty brown as before. A small TV was on the wall in his bedroom.

Wound around the lamp on the nightstand were the only two religious items I’d ever seen in the house. Both family relics. A string of rosary beads, which had belonged to Dono’s late sister. And a St. Christopher medal. Dono had told me once that my grandmother, his wife, had left the medal to my mother. It found its way back to Dono again when she died.

He’d added more bookshelves, which were crowded with nonfiction books on boats and naval battles and, most of all, about pirates. Dono probably knew as much about crime in the seventeenth century as he did about the twenty-first. He had told me once, when he was drunk and rambling a little, that he’d wanted to name my mother Grace, after the Irish pirate Grace O’Malley. My grandmother had prevailed, and Mom was named Moira instead.

The biggest difference to the upstairs was in my old room, which was nearly empty now, save for a few file boxes, an old rolltop desk, and a leather couch. Not that any of it had value, sentimental or otherwise.

I went back downstairs.

The pantry had once been a boiler closet. It was large enough to lie down in, if you were short. I moved a few cans of tomato soup out of the way to allow access to the back wall. Where Dono had built one of his little tricks.

It worked on the same principle as a Chinese puzzle box. Twist
a shelf support one half turn, move a bracket to the side, and presto. The drywall between the studs swung up with a gentle push against a spring hinge, revealing a foot-square hole.

There were a few things squirreled away in the small hollow. A lockpick gun and a more basic set of picks fashioned from dental tools. False driver’s licenses with Dono’s photo, in three names and three states. A mismatched pair of handguns—a little .32 and a newer, meaner nine-millimeter Browning. All useful in an emergency.

Each of these, or similar items, I remembered being in Dono’s hiding place the last time I’d seen it. He also used to keep cash on hand, maybe nine or ten grand in twenties and fifties. Nothing like that now. Maybe he’d switched to cash cards.

There were two sets of keys as well. The bigger set looked like its keys would fit the house and truck and other things around the place.

The second set was more unusual. Two pairs of keys. The first pair was silver and pistol-shaped, with the shaft of the key coming off the rounded head at a ninety-degree angle. Keys for an engine. Maybe a generator. The second pair was small and brass-colored. The four keys were attached to a small, rough chunk of reddish wood. Someone had drilled a hole in the wood, to thread the key chain through it. Odd. Not Dono’s usual style.