Red House Blues (20 page)

“Okay, for now I’ll pretend I believe you,”
said Marla. “But as I say, Alexis is no friend of mine. She’s a
good painter, I’ll give her that, but she’s a stone cold bitch when
it suits her. We’ve had our run-ins . . . ”

“Would she talk to me about Sean, do you
think? If she was his landlady she must have known him pretty
well.”

“Doubtful now that she’s seen you with
me.”

“I have to try. I want to
find his notebooks, the journals where he wrote down his thoughts.
It might help me get beyond all this if I knew what was going
through his head. At least I’d have something of his to remember
him by. I could live with that.”
I wonder
if that’s true? Or am I lying to myself again?

But who should she ask? Despite what Nick
had said, Sean must have had a friend in the house. It just didn’t
seem likely to have been his landlady.

Marla started the car and pulled away from
the curb.

“Are you up for a side trip, Suzy-Q?”

“What have you got in mind?”

“I was thinking, with Alexis at the Comet we
might drive by the house and see if anybody’s home.”

“Isn’t it kind of late to drop in on
people?” Knowing as soon as she said it that Marla’s crowd might
not consider midnight too late for visiting.

“It’s Saturday night. They’re still up if
they’re home.”

“So, you know the others who live
there?”

“Not all of them.”

Marla, not waiting for and answer, made a
jog off Yesler onto Fir Street. They drove at a crawl past the
house studying the windows for signs of life. The porch light was
on but that meant nothing. The upper windows were dark.

At the base of the hill Marla made a right
hand turn in front of the Pentecostal church.

“Pull over,” said Suzan.

Marla double parked beside a pickup truck
but kept the engine running.

“What?”

“I think I just saw a light on in the
kitchen.”

“I can’t see anything from here,” said
Marla. “Let’s go check it out.”

She whipped the Toyota around a traffic
circle at the end of the next block and returned to the house,
slipping into a vacant parking space behind a beat-up Ford van.

“Come on,” she said, shutting off the
ignition and getting out of the car.

“Now?”

“Getting cold feet? Haven’t you done enough
snooping and sniffing around? Time to shit or get your dainty butt
off the pot.”

“It’s midnight, for God’s sake.”

“So? Listen, the kitchen light probably
means Ferlin is awake. His room’s off the kitchen. If anybody can
tell you what you want to know it’s Ferlin, especially if Alexis
isn’t around. He’s certifiable, but he’s been here since the Big
Bang. He knows everything. Maybe he knows something about those
notebooks.”

“I don’t know . . .,” said Suzan as she
followed Marla up the mossy concrete steps to the side garden.

Her insides performed an annoying roll when
she saw the scooter and tarp were missing from beside the back
porch. If there wasn’t enough of the Vespa to tarp, what was left
of its rider? A few days earlier he was offering coffee and she was
nervously turning him down. If only she had the chance to take him
up on it now.

“Let’s go back to the car,” she said. “I’ll
come back tomorrow.”

“Keep it down.”

“No, I’m going back.” Suzan turned toward
the street.

Before she got two steps on the slick walk
Marla caught her jacket sleeve and spun her around, pulling her off
balance.

“You’re coming inside with me. I’m sick of
this crap,” she said, through her teeth. Suzan tried to wrench
herself free as Marla frog-marched her for the porch.

“What are you doing? Get your hands off me!”
She twisted and ducked out of her grasp, ready to bolt into the
tangled garden, when the back door flew open and a shaft of light
stunned her dead still on the bottom step.

Chapter 18

Ferlin exhaled a curse. Where was Gonzalo?
If he didn’t show up soon it was his loss, he thought. Not going to
stay up all night waiting on him. Should go to bed and let the dude
stand out in the cold empty handed. What he deserves, the little
shit.

He felt the house tighten around him, coil
like a steel band, as it did sometimes late at night. It was never
good when it did that. Another reason to go to bed with the last
half bottle of J. Beam.

Too many memories on a night like this, he
thought. That other night, over a decade ago, it was like this -
the night Kiki died. Didn’t seem that long ago, but Alexis and the
rest were talking about it tonight before they left for the Comet.
About how they remembered where they were when they found out, as
if they were talking about Kennedy or Lennon. But they were all too
young to remember either one of those. It struck Ferlin as slightly
comical.

I know what they think of me - all but
Alexis - that I’m a weird old wino, a museum piece you’d find
stuffed, propped next to an exhibit of tie-died Woodstock tee
shirts. They don’t know it but time’s catching up with them too -
not kids strung out on coke and Punk any more. There they were in
the living room, reminiscing like a bunch of geriatric Buddy Holly
fans. Remember this? Remember that? Had to laugh.

Yes, it was like this that night - quiet,
the house holding its breath. As if a house had breath to hold.
Like it was waiting for some deal to go down. Thoughts like that
get you locked up, man. Place is a big pile of dry wood, cracked
plaster and rat nests. For two cents I’d move but where would I go?
And there’s Alexis to consider. She likes the setup the way it is.
Alexis loves the old place. It excites her the way a side show fun
house excites. Always seeing ghosts in the damn thing, or so she
says. “You can always fill the rooms if the place has a rep as a
haunted house," she told him.

But Ferlin suspected she half believed her
own hype. Her paintings were crowded with the dead bodies and
ghosts she said she’d seen or “channeled” - paintings she hung all
over the damn house. She’d told her spook stories so many times he
could almost feel the cold spot at the top of the stairs himself
though he’d never seen any white lady on the stairs or heard
moaning in the attic. Alexis had a good imagination - what you’d
expect of an artist - but there was such a thing as getting carried
away with the dark side shit.

It’s a street drug, he thought, the crap
people talk themselves into to rev their clogged engines. Some
people use God, some use ghosts and auras - pure New Age bullshit.
When you come down to it, whatever you do to feel alive, it’s all
the same damn bullshit.

Still, though he’d never let on to Alexis,
Ferlin knew with dead certainty that the Red House had its moods -
a kind of internal weather that kicked up something fierce once in
a while, like the pain that plagued his joints when it rained. And
tonight a storm was brewing, that was for damn sure. A good night
to go to bed and not get up till the next afternoon - not that he’d
sleep. He didn’t sleep much any more. Maybe he was afraid he
wouldn’t wake up. Or maybe the dreams weren’t as interesting as
they used to be. He rubbed a hand over his stubbled chin, and went
to the fridge for some juice.

That was when he heard the voices on the
porch. About time Gonzalo got his sorry ass over here, thought
Ferlin. He better not have brought his homeboys with him. Ferlin
slid open the hydrator at the bottom of the refrigerator and
removed a plastic zippered bag. Unzipping it, he lifted out its
contents, chambered a round and went to open the back door.

“Whoa, Ferlin, stash the hardware,” said
Marla, pushing past him, dragging someone after her.

“Marla. Might have known,” said Ferlin. “I
was expecting someone else.”

“Must be someone special, considering the
reception.”

“Just some dude. Thought I heard more than
one out there. Looks like I was right. Who’s she?”

“Suzan, Sean Pike’s grieving widow,” said
Marla. “I need a favor.”

Looking more closely he recognized the blond
in the green jacket. The chick he’d seen watching the house. Taking
pictures. The one Nick let into the house.

“You know I don’t do favors, Marla. We could
talk a trade. Depends on what you need. Sit.”

Ferlin motioned with his gun hand toward the
breakfast nook.

Marla shoved Suzan onto a bench seat and
slid in next to her at the table, pinning her next to the window.
Suzan wasn’t going anywhere unless she dived over the tabletop.
Ferlin remained standing in the shadow cast by the lone bare bulb
glowing above the kitchen sink.

“Alexis won’t like you being here.”

“She’s not here. Just saw her at the
Comet.”

“She still won’t like it.”

“She won’t know if you don’t tell her,
Ferlin. Anybody in the house tonight besides you?”

“No.”

“Good. Hear anything more about how Nick is
doing?”

“Holding his own.”

“Glad to hear it. We want to go through his
stuff upstairs.”

“You want to search his room?”

“He won’t know.”

“Like hell he won’t. What do you think
you’re looking for anyway?”

“Something that belonged to Pike.”

“Whatever it is it’s not there. I cleared
his room myself after the cops got through. Boxed up everything he
left in that room before Nick moved in.”

“What about the rest of the house, Ferlin?
Must be some of his stuff still around somewhere.”

“Anything up there I sent to the address the
cops gave me last month. Even a guitar I probably could have sold.
Probably should have for my trouble. You tell me what it is you’re
looking for and I’ll tell you if I saw it.”

Suzan studied the old man from her vantage
point behind Marla - scrawny as a feral cat, unshaven, his greasy
gray hair twist-tied into a waist-length ponytail. She couldn’t
imagine this person carefully laundering, and almost lovingly
packing Sean’s belongings any more than she could imagine the woman
at the Comet doing the honors. It had to have been someone else.
But why would anyone lie about such a thing? Unless, thought Suzan,
he was covering for the one who actually shipped Sean’s things.
Unless he knew what was removed from Sean’s belongings and why.

Marla shifted on the bench and leaned toward
him.

“Could anyone have gotten into the boxes
after you stored them away?” she said.

“Possible,” he said. “But hell, Marla, it’s
late. You don’t want to say what you’re looking for? Fine. As I
say, I got somebody coming so unless you give me a reason I’d want
to do business with you, you need to take your friend here and
shove off.”

Suzan opened her mouth to say something then
shut it as Marla’s nails dug into her wrist under the table.

“Ronny Jonson,” said Marla.

Ferlin loomed over the table, his face
inches from Marla’s, the gun still clutched in his hand.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Maybe you didn’t kill him, but someone
dropped him like a dead rabbit at your feet. It brought the cops up
here and we both know cops aren’t your favorite people. First Kiki,
then Pike, then Jonson. The cops keep coming back to see you,
Ferlin, because you’re never too far away.”

“So? They know I didn’t have anything to do
with that shit. If I was going to off somebody they wouldn’t be
found around here. They’d never be found. Cops aren’t smart, but
they’re smart enough to know that.”

“True. Still, it’s not too good for business
having people nosing around, is it?”

“And you know who’s pointing in my
direction, is that it? I let you toss Nick’s room and you tell me
who my friends are? Don’t work like that, Marla. Give me a name and
I’ll decide what it’s worth to me.”

Marla let go of Suzan’s wrist and leaned her
head back against the banquette. She took a deep breath and let it
out slowly in a loud sigh.

“We’re getting nowhere, Ferlin,” she said.
“I’m thinking maybe I’m talking to the wrong person. Maybe we
should wait 'til Alexis gets home and see what she has to say.”

“I don’t think so,” said Ferlin. “She’d
throw you and her out on your asses.”

Suddenly Suzan knew she was in way over her
head, in a nasty house with people she had no business being with.
All she wanted to do was get out of there as fast as she could. Up
until now she’d felt at least partially in control but this was
real and a potentially deadly situation. To her surprise and
humiliation tears stung her eyes.

“Leave it, Marla, it’s over,” she said,
wiping her eyes with her sleeve. “Sean’s notebooks are gone and
even if they weren’t I don’t want to know what’s in them. It’s so
stupid! All I wanted was to find out if he still loved me after he
left. It isn’t worth upsetting everyone. Just let me the hell out
of here!”

She pushed Marla off the bench, ran to the
kitchen door, wrenched it open and fled into the night. She had
failed once again. It was over.

Chapter 19

Suzan scrambled across the back yard to the
street as fast as she could manage without tripping in the dark,
slowing to a choppy jog a few blocks away, listening for footsteps
behind her.

She wanted to put as much distance between
herself and that house as possible. Linda’s place was too close for
comfort. She couldn’t go there just then. Instead, she kept to the
opposite side of the street from the streetlights, picking her way
toward Twenty-third. She had no plan. It was after midnight but
maybe there might be a coffee shop still open. She could sit down.
Consider what to do next.

It was panic, pure and simple. She had
freaked out and bolted, which was not like her at all. She couldn’t
even remember the last time she had come apart like that. Not even
at Sean’s funeral. She wasn’t normally the weepy kind. What was
happening to her, anyway? Was she totally losing her mind?