Scorcher (19 page)

“Amigo,”
Desoto said, when Carver had picked up the phone and mumbled a hello. “Edwina’s okay.”

Carver was still half asleep, and caught off guard by the cold thrust of alarm in the pit of his stomach. “Okay? Why shouldn’t she be?”

“There was a fire at her house last night. I got it on the telex from Del Moray.”

Carver’s mind jumped all the way to a hundred and ten percent wakefulness, thoughts a wild jumble.
A fire!
Where he’d left her so she’d be safely out of his presence! If there was going to be an attempt at murder by arson, it should have been here, at the cottage. He told himself to slow down, not to speculate. Coincidences did happen, even in the lives of cynics and the people they loved. “Is she hurt at all?”

“No. I phoned there and was told a smoke alarm woke her up and she crawled out of the house completely unharmed. Damned fine little gadgets to have around, eh? Like watchdogs that don’t eat.”

“Where is she now?”

“Her place. Hey, I told you, she’s all right. The emergency’s over, my friend.”

Over for now, Carver thought. Fire had been introduced into his life like hell on earth, maiming him in body and then mind. First fire from the barrel of a sadistic holdup man’s gun, then from the mind of a maniac. As if he’d done something to piss off a supreme being that liked to play with matches.

“I’m driving to Del Moray,” Carver said.

“Thought you’d want to,
amigo.
That’s why I called.”

“Was the fire an accident?”

“Could be. Lots of lightning in that area last night. But it’s too early to tell. Thinking about Paul Kave?”

“I can’t stop thinking about him.”

“And maybe now,
amigo
, he can’t stop thinking about you.”

The eastern horizon was still smeared with orange-tinted pink, like an art student’s garish first attempt at a sunrise, when Carver reached the highway and pointed the long hood of the Olds toward Del Moray.

Last night’s storm had left the air clear and sweet-scented, and he had the top lowered. Large flying insects smacked off the windshield to abrupt oblivion. A sea gull soared gracefully along parallel to the car for a while, as if blatantly observing Carver, then veered sharply to the south, maybe on its way to report to McGregor.

Carver felt as if he were in deep water that was beginning to swirl and draw him toward the black vortex of a whirlpool. He cursed and goosed the Olds another five miles per hour faster.

If he drowned—or burned—he wanted to do it alone. Not with Edwina.

As if death came with options.

A
S
C
ARVER BRAKED
the Olds to turn into the driveway of Edwina’s home, a yellow-orange fire engine gave a shattering blast of its air horn, flashed more different-colored lights than Carver could remember seeing even at Christmas, and bounced from the drive onto the highway. The jackhammer roar of its powerful diesel engine reverberated as it disappeared into the bright morning like a chimera.

Carver expected to see more fire-fighting equipment when he topped the crest of the driveway, but there were only Edwina’s red Mercedes, parked well away from the garage, and a yellow Plymouth with a cherry light on its roof and the seal of the Del Moray Fire Department on its door. The garage itself was blackened, and half the roof had either collapsed or been axed in by the fire fighters. He noticed that the front end of the Mercedes was also blackened, and both front tires were flat and melted like modernistic soft sculpture.

Edwina and a short, dark-haired man in a bright white shirt weren’t looking at the car, though; they were staring up at the house as if assessing damage. The white shirt looked incredibly clean and pure, contrasted with the charred areas from the fire. When they heard Carver’s car parking near the yellow Plymouth, they turned and looked in his direction. Edwina seemed relieved to see him and leaned slightly toward him. White Shirt stood his ground and gave Carver the flat, disinterested but appraising stare of officialdom everywhere. Carver saw now that there were epaulets on the man’s pristine shirt, and a gold insignia sewn above the left breast pocket. He wondered if firemen saluted.

Carver hugged Edwina and listened to her assurances that she was all right. She seemed calm and unafraid. He sensed a vibrant anger in her, held in check beneath her surface but seething.

White Shirt stood patiently waiting for the scene to run down, glancing only once at Carver’s cane. Edwina stepped away from Carver; her eyes were puffy, as if still irritated by smoke. She said, “This is Chief Belmont of the Del Moray Fire Department. Chief, Fred Carver.”

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Carver,” Belmont said, not moving to shake hands. He spoke in a slow Georgia drawl that probably led people to underestimate him. He was in his fifties, starting to go to fat, and had pale, doughy features, what was either a burn scar or a birthmark high on his forehead, and murky green eyes the color of martini olives. His black, probably dyed hair, was swept back but mussed, as if combs were for pansies and he’d raked his head with his fingers. He looked as if he needed sleep. “Miss Talbot here tells me you mighta been the target of this.”

“You mean the fire was deliberately set?” Carver had never really doubted it.

“Oh, it’s sure-enough arson. Damage is mostly to the garage. Flames got to the insulation in the wall and smoke curled over the ceiling and set off one of those five-dollar alarms. It saved Miss Talbot’s life, most likely. Don’t take long for smoke to work its way down and fill a burning house. Sneaky stuff. Kill you while you sleep.”

Carver had once almost died himself in a late-night fire. He knew the danger of slumber and smoke. For an instant he relived the panic he’d felt on awakening and realizing what was happening. Suffocation in the dark. Still real. Still scary.

“Maybe you’d better stay somewhere else for a while,” he told Edwina.

Her smooth chin was thrust forward like that of an amateur boxer with too much heart and too little skill, begging to be hit to show she could take it. “I’m not leaving my home because of this. Besides, whoever set the fire must have thought you were still here.”

“My car was gone,” Carver pointed out.

“Maybe he thought it was still in the garage. That’s where you had it parked. He might have seen you drive in but not out.”

Carver didn’t answer. Edwina had given this some thought. He looked at the chief, who seemed puzzled.

“You saying you know who mighta done this?” Belmont asked. He asked it lazily, almost as if inquiring about whether Carver thought it might rain today.

“I have some idea,” Carver said. “I’m a private investigator working on a case involving fire.”

“Arson case?”

“Murder.”

Comprehension transformed the chief’s pale features. The murky olive eyes narrowed and gained intensity. “That screwball that torches folks, huh?”

“That’s the one,” Carver said.

“Well, the law’s gonna want to talk with you about this anyway, the way it was so damned obviously arson. Young lady here’s lucky to be still amongst the living.”

“How was it done?” Carver asked.

“Show you,” Belmont said, and waved an arm a few inches in a signal to follow. He was a man comfortable in his authority and took for granted compliance with his orders.

The three of them walked around to the back of the garage. The ground was soggy there; Carver had to prod gingerly with the cane. Belmont pointed to a buckled and charred area of wall near where the garage joined the rear of the house. There were blackened chunks of debris scattered around, and pieces of roof tile. It looked like the scene of a pyromaniac’s wild party.

“That wall’s stucco,” Carver said. “Stucco doesn’t burn.”

“Does if you pour a flammable substance on it. Which was done here, I’m sure. Burned long enough to catch the wooden eaves, then the flames walked across the roof timbers of the garage. Good thing we got here before it got a hold on the house. We’d have had to create some real water and smoke damage inside to put this thing out. Sometimes we gotta make a helluva mess dousing a fire, but there’s no other way.”

“The house is all right,” Edwina said. “It smells like burned rubber but it’s relatively undamaged. I can live in it. I
will
live in it.”

“You don’t have to,” Carver said.

“Sure I do.” Her voice was low and unyielding, the mind behind it made up. Carver remembered her telling him she would never again run from trouble and create a past that haunted. She’d meant it. “I’m not letting Paul Kave influence my life,” she said, “any more than you would. You should understand that.”

“You’re acting stubborn.”

“As you are. But is yours an act?”

“No.”

“A little empathy then, huh?”

“I think Paul might have tried to kill you as a way of taunting me,” he said.

“Even if that’s so, he isn’t likely to try again. I’m staying.”

“Why isn’t he likely to try again?”

“I’d say he’s made his point.”

“Maybe he doesn’t think so.”

“I’m staying, Carver. Nobody like that is pulling my strings and making me walk.”

If she’d had a stick, she’d have used it to draw a line in the mud and dared him to cross it. Carver knew it was no good arguing with her when she got this way.

But Belmont didn’t know her and couldn’t keep his mouth shut. “Mr. Carver seems to make good sense, ma’am.”

She showed him what real fire was in her glance and stalked away toward the front of the house, her blue Nikes making squishing sounds with each step.

Belmont looked at Carver and shrugged. Then they followed Edwina. Carver noticed that the swimming pool was only half full; the fire-department pumpers had used it as a source of water to fight the blaze.

The chief left and a lieutenant named Braddock from the Del Moray Police Department arrived and questioned Carver briefly. He agreed with the chief and Carver that Edwina should stay somewhere else until Paul Kave was apprehended. He tried to persuade her with horror stories of fire victims, then with official bluff, now and then turning to Carver, who nodded agreement to everything the lieutenant said. Edwina finally got angry and told them both to fuck off. The lieutenant left shortly thereafter, obviously wondering why Carver wasn’t leaving with him. The man didn’t understand the territorial imperative as it related to wild animals and to Edwina.

Carver and Edwina stood near the fire-damaged Mercedes and watched the lieutenant’s car disappear down the driveway. The last of the official vehicles was gone; the ordeal was ended. The sea was pounding on the beach below, sounding like a ponderous heartbeat, and the sun was high enough now to have gained leverage and bore down with heat that weighed and withered and would dominate the day. Carver glanced toward the vast sparkling sea and his eyes ached from the glare. He limped toward the front door.

“Where are you going?” Edwina asked.

“Gonna make a call, if the phone still works.”

“It works,” she said, walking beside him. Her head was bowed and she was trying to come to terms with what had happened. This was damned personal, this setting fire to a woman’s home while she slept. “Who you going to call?” she asked, as they reached the door.

“Lloyd Van Meter at Van Meter Investigations. I’m going to get some manpower assigned to watch you in case Paul Kave tries something like this again. Here or somewhere else, like maybe a display home you’re holding open.” He paused by the phone and looked hard at her. “We going to argue about this?”

“No,” she said. She crossed the room to the sofa and plopped into it like a loose-limbed teen-ager. It was more a gesture of weariness than of defiance. “You make sense, actually. I’m being unreasonable, but then people should be unreasonable at times.” She crossed her long legs. She was wearing shorts, and there was a clump of mud smeared on her right calf. She twined her legs as if she felt cold, and some of the mud smudged her left calf. Her expression was placid and thoughtful. Carver wondered if she had ever lost her poise, even as an infant when she got ticked off over having to eat strained vegetables. “You’re right, I’m wrong,” she said, “about everything. I should leave, but I’m staying.”

“I don’t know,” Carver said. “Maybe this really is one of those times to ignore reason. You’re the only one who can judge, I guess.” He punched out the Van Meter number and waited while the phone at the other end of the connection rang. “But I still wish you’d leave.”

He noticed Edwina was right about one thing: the house did smell like burned rubber.

So much better than burned flesh.

W
HAT A PIECE
of work was Lloyd Van Meter. Carver had met him when he was an Orlando police officer and Van Meter was searching for the wayward lover of a wealthy New York woman. Carver had arrested the man on a burglary charge, and Van Meter had appeared in a flurry of sound and confusion at police headquarters with a local, high-powered attorney and had the man sprung and back in Manhattan within hours. Red tape ensued, miles of it, and as far as Carver knew the man had never returned to Florida and been tried for breaking and entering. Carver had figured at the time that Lloyd Van Meter had unique talents as a private investigator. He’d been right. The woman in Manhattan had been a wealthy socialite who ran an expensive and exclusive call-girl operation from her mansion on Long Island. She’d rewarded Lloyd Van Meter bountifully for finding her lover and expediting his escape from legal consequences.

And now Van Meter had one of the largest investigative agencies in Florida, with offices in Miami, Orlando, and Tampa. Carver liked Van Meter, who claimed to be the illegitimate son of a notorious Prohibition-era gangster, Homer Van Meter. The present Van Meter, more or less on the right side of the law, was an obese man in his fifties, with a head of thick, flowing white hair, sharply defined features despite his weight, and a white beard that, though not all that long, lent him a distinctly biblical air. It was as if Moses had discovered pasta. He wore round glasses with gold wire frames, and he looked younger than he was until he removed the glasses and revealed the deep crow’s-feet at the corners of his shrewd blue eyes. He was always sloppily and peculiarly dressed, as if he bought his clothes at an awning company and settled for bargain fabrics that weren’t moving well. Today he had on a beige suit with darker tan vertical stripes. Van Meter’s tie was gold with brown stripes running diagonally. He was color-coordinated but the effect was dizzying.