The Emperor of Ocean Park (74 page)

Other than my wife, nobody in Elm Harbor knows that I have made this trip. I hope to keep it that way. I am not technically exceeding the rules Dean Lynda laid down—it is Friday, so I am missing no classes—but I do not imagine she would be thrilled to discover that I have flown off to visit . . . the man I have flown off to visit. Being the helpful fellow I am, I would rather not add needless complications to Lynda’s job. So I am not planning to tell her.

I glance at the window again, but the view is as disturbing as ever, and I hastily turn away to continue my circuit of the room. I pause in front of the fireplace, where the wall is dominated by a huge oil painting of Uncle Jack’s late wife, Camilla, the one he is supposed to have killed, or had killed. The portrait is at least seven feet high. Camilla wears a flowing white gown, her jet-black hair piled on her head, her pale face surrounded by an unearthly light, probably in an effort to suggest
an angelic nature. It reminds me of those idealized paintings of the Renaissance, when the artists took care to make their patrons’ wives glow. I am willing to bet that the portrait was done after Camilla’s violent death, for the artist appears to have worked from a blown-up photograph, so that the result appears not so much ethereal as fake.

“Not one of his better works, is it?” sighs Jack Ziegler from behind me.

(II)

I
DO NOT STARTLE EASILY
. I do not startle now. I do not even turn around. I lean over to squint at the artist’s name, but it is an illegible scrawl.

“It’s not bad,” I murmur generously, pivoting to face Abby’s godfather, and recalling the answer that ended my father’s chance for the Supreme Court.
I don’t judge my friends based on rumors,
he said when they asked about Camilla; then he folded his arms, signaling his contempt for the audience.

Jack Ziegler’s arms are folded, too.

“He’s not a real artist anyway,” Jack Ziegler continues, dismissing the painting with a flap of one trembling hand. “So famous, so honored, yet he paints my wife for
money.”

I nod, not sure, now that I am facing Uncle Jack, quite how to proceed. He stands before me in bathrobe and bedroom slippers, his face thinner and grayer than before, and I wonder whether he has more than a few months left. But his eyes remain bright—mad and gleeful and alert.

Jack Ziegler slips his skinny arm into mine and conducts me slowly around the room, evidently assuming that in my desperation, or perhaps my fear, I will be fascinated by what his illicitly obtained wealth has purchased. He points to a lighted display case holding his small but impressive collection of incunabula, some of them doubtless on Interpol watch lists. He shows me a small tray of magnificent Mayan artifacts that the government of Belize certainly does not know have left the country. He turns me to look back the way I came in. The wall below the balcony is covered by a huge fabric hanging, all multicolored vertical lines that attract and confuse the eye. There is a pattern hidden there, and the brain’s stubborn determination to work it out holds the
gaze. The piece is enormously beautiful. Uncle Jack tells me with unfeigned pride that it is a genuine Gunta Stölzl, and I nod admiringly, even though I have no earthly idea who, or even what sex, Gunta Stölzl is, or was.

“So, Talcott,” he wheezes when our guided tour of his little museum is over. We are standing before the window once more, neither of us wanting to be the one to begin. As we measure each other, recessed ceiling speakers bark the hard musical edges of Sibelius’s
Finlandia,
which has always struck me, despite its energetic pretensions, as one of the most depressing compositions in the classical repertoire. But it is perfect for the moment.

When I say nothing, Uncle Jack coughs twice, then moves swiftly onward: “So, you are here, you have made it, I am pleased to see you, but time is short. So, what can I do for you? You said on the telephone that the matter was urgent.”

At first, I can manage only a nervous “Yes.” To see Jack Ziegler so close up, his near-twin bodyguards waiting in the wings, his eyes glittering, not quite mad but not quite sane, waiting impatiently for me to explain myself, is quite different from sitting on an airplane planning how the dialogue will go.

“You said you had some trouble.”

“You could say that.”

“You
said that.”

Again I hesitate. What I am experiencing is not so much fear as a reluctance to commit myself; for, once I enter upon a serious conversation with Uncle Jack, I am not sure I can pull free of him.

“As you might or might not know, I’ve been looking into my father’s past. What I’ve found has been . . . disturbing. And then there are other things, things that have happened over the past couple of months, which are also disturbing.”

Jack Ziegler stares silently. He is prepared, it would seem, to wait all afternoon and into the night. He does not feel threatened. He does not feel afraid. He does not seem to feel
anything
—which is part of his power. I wonder afresh whether he really murdered his own wife, and whether he felt anything at all if he did it.

“People have been following me,” I blurt out, feeling idiotic, and when Uncle Jack still refuses to be drawn, I simply tell the whole story, from the moment he left me in the cemetery to the fake FBI agents to the white pawn to Freeman Bishop’s murder to Colin Scott’s drowning
at Menemsha to the book that mysteriously reappeared. I omit Maxine, perhaps because keeping at least one secret in the face of Jack Ziegler’s demanding glare is all the victory I am likely to win.

When he is sure that I am finished, Uncle Jack shrugs his shoulders.

“I do not know why you are telling me this,” he says gloomily. “I assured you on the day of your father’s burial that you are in no danger. I will protect you as I promised Oliver I would. You and your family both. I keep my promises. Nobody will harm you. Nobody will harm your family. It is impossible. Completely impossible. I have seen to it.” He shifts his weight, evidently from physical pain. “Chess pieces? A missing book? Men hiding in the woods?” He shakes his head. “These are not disturbing, Talcott. I had frankly hoped for better from you.”

“But the men who got their fingers cut off . . .”

“I will protect
you,
” he emphasizes, flapping a hand, and I comprehend instantly that I may not step another inch down that road. For a harrowing instant, I know true fear. “You and your family. As long as I live.”

“I understand.”

“If these men truly accosted you, I would think their misfortune was a sign that you are truly safe.” Jack Ziegler lets his meaning sink in. Then his bleary eyes find mine. “I had hoped you were here with news of the arrangements.”

I pause. There is opportunity here, I can sense it, if I can only get my creaky brain back into operation. “Not
news
exactly. But I think I might be on the track.”

Once more I hesitate to press forward. If I complete the thought, I am committed to my path. I made my decision long before landing in Aspen, but between the decision and the act God has placed the will; and the will is quite sensitive to terror.

Still Abby’s godfather waits.

“But, well, if you could just explain a couple of things to me—well, things would be so much easier.” I am annoyed at myself. Just as in the cemetery, I am tongue-tied in Uncle Jack’s presence. I suppose I have reason: Jack Ziegler is a murderer many times over, an efficient broker in just about every illegal substance, a middleman to the underworld, with connections to organized crime so complex, so neatly obscured, that nobody has ever quite succeeded in tracking them down.

Yet everybody knows they are there.

“A couple of things,” he repeats, promising nothing. I notice a line
of perspiration along his forehead. His hands as he brushes it away betray a slight tremor, and his eyes intermittently lose their focus. An attack of nerves? His illness? “A couple of things,” he says again.

I nod, swallow, steal a glance out the window, this time without quite feeling like I am tumbling off the mountain—but still I cannot figure out how the house stays up.

I look back at Jack Ziegler again, and I realize, from the fact that he is waiting with so much patience, from the fact that he agreed to see me at all, that he is every bit as needy as I am. So my voice is calmer and more certain when I say: “First, I was wondering if you saw my father, oh, about a year and a half ago. A year ago last October. Around then.”

His eyes cloud again, and I realize he is actually trying to remember. “No,” he says at length. “No, I think not. At that time I would still have been in Mexico for my treatments.” He sounds uncertain, not deceptive. Still, it is hard to be sure. “Why?”

“I just wondered.” Realizing this sounds ridiculous, I reinterpret it. “I . . . heard a rumor, I guess.”

“And is that why you came all this way, Talcott? To chase down a rumor?”

“No.” Time to roll the dice. “No, Uncle Jack, I came because I want to ask you about Colin Scott.”

“And who, please, is Colin Scott?”

I hesitate. Colin Scott, I know from Ethan Brinkley, had several names, and there is no reason to think Jack Ziegler knows them all. On the other hand, if, as I suspect, he has been keeping tabs on my life these last few months, he can hardly have failed to hear the name once or twice.

“Colin Scott,” I repeat. “He used to be called Villard. Jonathan Villard. He was a private detective. My father hired him to find out who was in the car that killed Abby. Your goddaughter.”

Now it is Jack Ziegler’s turn to hesitate. He is trying to work out how much I know and how much I am guessing and how much he can hide. He does not like being vulnerable to me, and his willingness to show me this calculating side suggests that he wants my help.

“And?” he asks.

“I think you used to know him in the CIA.”

“And?”

“And you had to be the one who put my father in contact with him.”

“And?” Not even telling me if I am hot or cold. There is a wheeze in
his voice, wet and sickly. He puts a hand flat over his chest, then bursts into a fit of phlegmy coughing, doubling over. Instinctively, I take his arm, which, beneath the bathrobe, has melted away almost to the bone. Harrison is next to us in an instant, gently removing my fingers, guiding Uncle Jack to the sofa, handing him a tall glass of water.

Jack Ziegler gulps the water, and the coughing subsides.

“Please sit down, Professor,” the wiry Harrison orders gravely. His voice is a reedy chirp, and I look twice to make sure he really is the tough guy he obviously wants to appear. I examine his shoulders and decide that he is.

I sit as commanded, on a spindly chair across from the scariest man I know. Harrison proffers a pill, which Uncle Jack waves peevishly away. Harrison’s outstretched hand might be carved from stone. Uncle Jack glares but finally yields, swallowing the pill, swigging the water.

Harrison withdraws.

Could he, too, be a nurse? Am I imagining too much? I glance at the infamous Jack Ziegler, slumped on the gorgeous sofa, spittle on his dry lips, his hand waving feebly, but not in time to the music. Why was I so afraid of him? He is sick, he is dying, he is scared. I look around the room. Not a museum, a mausoleum. My heart is seized with an unexpected wave of pity for the man huddled across from me. We sit in silence for a few minutes, or, rather, we sit without talking:
Finlandia
has been replaced by what sounds like Wagner, although I am unable to identify the piece. Jack Ziegler leans back on the sofa, his eyes closed.

“Please excuse me, Talcott,” he whispers without moving. “I am not yet recovered.” He does not say from what.

“I understand.” I pause, but I am too well bred to avoid what I must say next: “If it would be easier for you, I can come back another time.”

“Nonsense.” Another cough, not as loud, but dry and rattling and obviously painful. He opens his eyes. “You are here, you have come this great distance, you have questions. You may ask.”
Although I may not answer,
he is telling me.

“Colin Scott,” I say again.

Jack Ziegler blinks, his eyes watery and ancient and mildly confused. I try to remember all the crimes he is supposed to have committed, all the connections with the Mafia, with the arms dealers and the drug lords and other people whose livelihood depends on the misery of others. But I am finding it difficult to recall why this doddering old man seemed so scary a moment ago. I remind myself about the men whose
hands were mutilated after they attacked me, but it stirs less horror than before.

“What about him?” Uncle Jack finally says, blinking hard.

“I don’t think my father paid him. There don’t seem to be any canceled checks in my father’s papers.” I decided before I ever set foot in this house to leave Mariah out of it. Best that Abby’s godfather find it necessary to kill no more than one of Abby’s siblings.

“What was it for which your father failed to pay?”

“For the work he did. Tracking down the sports car.” I swallow, my uneasiness building afresh as his face strengthens once more, but the time for caution was before I lifted the receiver to call Jack Ziegler in the first place. “My father didn’t pay him for his work.”

“So?”

This single syllable possesses an affect heretofore missing: a sleeping beast seems to be slowly waking, and Jack Ziegler does not seem nearly so doddering.

“I don’t imagine he worked for free,” I say carefully.

“So?”

My fear is creeping back, stroking my back and thighs with chilly fingers. Somehow, Uncle Jack has altered the temperature of our conversation.

“I think . . . I think you paid him. Paid the detective.”

“I paid him?” The coal-black eyes are sharper now, and my stomach is touched by the same twisting unease I felt when I was a child on the Vineyard and my father gave me a torch and ordered me to burn a hornets’ nest Mariah had discovered in the eaves above the porch. I knew then that unless I got every one of them I was going to be stung. A lot.

“That’s what I think.”