The Murder Book (58 page)

“Except that Schwinn knew you’d put the original fix in. Once he was out of the way, you figured out a way to make everything work for you. You’re nothing if not adaptable, John.”

Broussard sighed. “Now you’re being obstinate. As I told you, the directive was related to Schwinn’s—”

“So what, John? If Walt Obey’s half as righteous as you claim, he likes you because you’ve convinced him you’re a choirboy. Schwinn comes forward, makes noises, sullies your rep, it’s a threat to your executive wet dream. So he had to go, too. It’s like bowling, isn’t it? Human tenpins. Set ’em up, knock ’em down.”

“No,” said Broussard. “I sent Craig to talk to Schwinn. To find out exactly what he knew. Why would I kill him? He could’ve been useful to me. Without him, I turned to you.”

“A seizure.”

Broussard nodded. “Craig was driving to Schwinn’s ranch, saw Schwinn ride his horse out the gates and followed along. There was a — there was contact, and Craig introduced himself and Schwinn got hostile. He’d wanted me to respond personally, not send a delegate. The man was presumptuous. Craig tried to reason with him. To get the facts of the case. Schwinn denied he’d had anything to do with the book, then he started to rave about DNA — finding semen samples, solving everything overnight.”

“Except there were no samples,” said Milo. “Everything had been destroyed. Schwinn would’ve loved hearing that.”

“He was irrational, tried to charge Craig on horseback, but the horse wouldn’t cooperate. Craig did his best to calm Schwinn down, but Schwinn started to dismount and suddenly his eyes rolled back in his head and he began salivating and convulsing. The horse must’ve panicked and lost its footing. It tumbled into the gully, Schwinn had one foot caught in the stirrup, got dragged, his head collided with a rock. Craig ran to help him, but it was too late.”

“So Craig left the scene.”

Broussard didn’t answer.

“Terrific story,” said Milo. “Forget building cities, John. Write a screenplay.”

“Maybe I will,” said Broussard. “One day, when it’s no longer raw.”

“When what isn’t?”

“The pain. None of this has been easy for me.”

Broussard’s left cheek ticked. He sighed. Injured nobility.

Milo hit him.

T
he blow connected square with the chief’s nose and knocked him flat on his rear.

Broussard sat in the dust fronting Janie’s grave, blood streaming from his nostrils, striping his Italian shirt, the beautiful golden tie, crimson deepening to rust as it met the pinstripe of his custom-made lapel.

He said, “It’s good I already have a broad nose.”

Smiling. Taking hold of the silk foulard in his breast pocket and wiping away the blood.

Making no attempt to get to his feet.

“You’re immature, Detective. That’s your problem, always has been. Reducing everything to black-and-white, the way a child does. Maybe it’s tied in with your other problem. Generally arrested development.”

“Maturity’s highly overrated,” said Milo. “Mature people act like you.”

“I survive,” said Broussard. “My grandfather never learned to read. My father went to college, then to music school, learned classical trombone but couldn’t get a job so he worked his whole life as a porter at the Ambassador Hotel. Your problem can be concealed. You were born with unlimited opportunities, so spare me the pious lectures about morality. And don’t even think about hitting me again. If you raise your hand to me, I’ll shoot you and make up a plausible story to justify it.”

He patted his left hip, revealed the bulge under the pinstripe. Just a few subtle inches afforded by great tailoring.

“You could shoot me, anyway,” said Milo. “Sometime when I’m not expecting it.”

“I could, but I won’t,” said Broussard. “Unless you make it necessary.” He pressed silk to his nose. Blood continued to flow. “If you act reasonably, I won’t even send you the cleaning bill.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning you’ve gotten it all out of your system and are prepared to return to work under new circumstances.”

“Such as?”

“We forget about this, you’re promoted to lieutenant. Assigned to a division of your choosing.”

“Why would I want to push paper?” said Milo.

“No paper, you’ll be a lieutenant detective,” said Broussard. “Continue to work cases — challenging cases, but you pull a lieutenant’s salary, enjoy a lieutenant’s prestige.”

“That’s not the way it works in the department.”

“I’m still the chief.” Broussard got to his feet, pretended to accidentally spread a flap of his double-breasted jacket, offered a full view of the 9mm nestled in a tooled-leather holster the color of fine brandy.

“You toss me a bone, and I go away,” said Milo.

“Why not?” said Broussard. “Everything’s been done that needs to be done. You solved the case, the bad guys are out of the picture, we all move on. What’s the alternative, ruining both our lives? Because the worse you hurt me, the more pain you bring on yourself. I don’t care how righteous you think you are, that’s the way the world works. Think about Nixon and Clinton and all those other paragons of virtue. They got libraries, and all the people around them went down hard.”

Broussard stepped closer. Milo could smell his citrus aftershave and his sweat and the coppery tang of the blood that had finally begun to dry above his mouth.

“I’ve kept records,” said Milo. “A paper trail hidden where even you’ll never find it. Something happens to me—”

“Oh, please, look who’s talking about screenplays,” said Broussard. “You want to throw around threats? Think about Dr. Silverman. Dr. Delaware. Dr. Harrison.” Broussard laughed. “Sounds like a medical convention. You can be damaged beyond your wildest dreams. And to what end? What’s the point?”

He flashed a smile. Winner’s smile. A cold, damp wave of futility washed over Milo. Sapped; the blow to Broussard’s nose had taken more out of him than it had out of its recipient.

Winners and losers, the patterns were probably set in place back in nursery school.

He said, “What about Bosc?”

“Craig has resigned from the department with substantial compensation, effective one week ago. He’ll never go near you — that I can promise you.”

“He does, he’s a dead man.”

“He realizes that. He’s relocating to another city. Another state.” Broussard wiped away blood, checked his handkerchief, found a clean corner and made sure it showed when he tucked the silk square back in his breast pocket. Buttoning his shirt and knotting his tie, he advanced even closer to Milo.

Breathing slowly, evenly. The bastard had sweet breath, minty-fresh. No more sweat on his ebony face. His nose had started to swell, looked a little off kilter, but nothing you’d notice once he got cleaned up.

“So,” he said.

“Lieutenant,” said Milo.

“Fast-track promotion, Detective Sturgis, once you choose your division. You can take some vacation time or jump right into work. Think of it as mutually constructive adaptation.”

Milo stared into the flat, black eyes. Hating Broussard and admiring him.
Oh great guru of self-deception, teach me to live as you do…

He said, “Fuck your promotion. I’ll drop everything, but I don’t want anything from you.”

“How noble,” said Broussard. “As if you had a choice.”

He turned and walked away.

Milo remained by the grave, let his eyes wander over Janie’s stone. Goddamn teddy bear.

Knowing there was nothing he could do, if he wanted to stay in the department, he’d take the offer and why the hell not, because anyone who mattered was dead and he was tired, so tired, and what
was
the alternative?

Making a choice. Not sure of what it would do to him — to his soul.

Someone else might have convinced himself that was courage.

Someone else wouldn’t feel this way.

B
ert Harrison’s call came at 9
A.M.
I’d been sleeping and tried to push the fatigue out of my voice, but Bert knew he’d woken
me up.

“Sorry, Alex. I’ll call back—”

“No,” I said. “How’re you doing?”

“
I’m
fine,” he said. “Aimee is… she’ll eventually come to grips with the loss. We’d begun dealing with it, because Bill didn’t have long, and I was trying to prepare her. Despite that, of course, the shock was traumatic. For her sake, I’m emphasizing the quickness of it. His feeling no pain.”

“I can back you up on that. It was instantaneous.”

“You saw it… you must be—”

“I’m fine, Bert.”

“Alex, I should’ve been honest with you all along. You deserved better from me.”

“You had your obligations,” I said. “Patient-doctor confidentiality—”

“No, I—”

“It’s all right, Bert.”

He laughed. “Listen to us, Alex. Alphonse, Gaston, Alphonse Gaston… you’re really okay, son?”

“I really am.”

“Because you bore the brunt of it as I stood by like a—”

“It’s over,” I said, firmly.

“Yes,” he said. Several seconds passed. “I need to tell you this, Alex: You’re such a
good
young man. I find myself calling you ‘son’ from time to time, because if I’d… oh this is silly, I just called to see how you were getting on and to let you know we’re coping. The human spirit and all that.”

“Indomitable,” I said.

“What’s the alternative?”

Milo had come by last night, and we’d talked through sunrise. I’d been thinking a lot about alternatives. “Thanks for calling, Bert. Let’s get together. When things settle down.”

“Yes. Absolutely. We must.”

He sounded old and weak and I wanted to help him, and I said, “Soon you’ll be getting back to your instruments.”

“Pardon — oh, yes, definitely. As a matter of fact, I did get on-line early this morning. Came upon an old Portuguese gitarra on eBay that looks intriguing, if it can be restored. Tuned differently than a guitar, but you might be able to get some sound out of it. If I get it at the right price, I’ll let you know and you can come up here and we’ll make music.”

“Sounds like a plan,” I said. Happy to have any.

T
he next few days degraded to a blur of solitude and missed opportunity. I took a long time to muster the energy to call Robin, never found her in.

She didn’t call back, not once, and I wondered if a new level had been descended.

I tried not to think about Janie Ingalls or any of the others, did a pretty decent job of cutting myself off, knew it was unlikely Allison Gwynn had read about Michael Larner’s death in the
Santa Barbara News-Press
and that I should tell her. I couldn’t dredge up the initiative for that, either.

I buried myself in housecleaning, yardwork, clumsy jogs, TV hypnosis, obligatory, tasteless meals, perusals of the morning paper — not a word of print about the bloody night in Ojai, the Larners, the Cossacks. Continued sniping at John G. Broussard by politicians and pundits were the only links to what had been my reality since receiving the murder book.

On an uncommonly mild Tuesday, I took an afternoon run and came back to find Robin sitting in the living room.

She had on a black T-shirt, black leather jeans, and the pair of lizard-skin boots I’d given her two birthdays ago. Her hair was long and loose, and she was made up and lipsticked and looked like a beautiful stranger.

When I went over to kiss her, I kept the bruised side of my face out of view. She offered me her lips but kept them closed. Her hand rested briefly on the back of my neck, then dropped off.

I sat down beside her. “Tour over early?”

“I took a day off,” she said. “Flew in from Omaha.”

“How’s it going?”

She didn’t answer. I took her hand. Her fingers were cool and limp as they brushed against my burnt palm.

“Before we get into anything,” she said, “I’m going to tell you about Sheridan. He knew to bring a Milk-Bone because he’d met Spike before, has dogs of his own.”

“Robin, I’m—”

“Please, Alex. Just listen.”

I let go of her hand, sat back.

“Sheridan comes on strong,” she said, “and his job puts him in close proximity to me, so I suppose I can understand your suspicions. But just for the record, he’s a born-again Christian, married, has four kids under the age of six. He brings his entire family on tour with him, it’s kind of a running joke with the rest of the crew. His wife’s name is Bonnie, and she used to be a backup singer before she and Sheridan found religion. Both of them are what you’d expect from new converts: way too joyful, zealous, upright, quoting scripture. It’s annoying, but everyone puts up with it because Sheridan’s a nice person, and he’s about the best tour coordinator in the business. When he does try to influence me it’s in the form of not-so-subtle little asides about accepting Christ into my life, not sleazy little ploys to get in my pants. And yes, I know religious observance doesn’t necessarily prevent bad behavior, but this guy means it. He’s never come within a mile of anything remotely sexual. Most of the time when he’s in my room, Bonnie’s right there with him.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“I wasn’t after an apology, Alex. I just wanted to tell you in person. So you wouldn’t torture yourself.”

“Thank you.”

“What happened to your hand and your face?”

“Long story.”

“The same story,” she said.

“I suppose.”

“That’s the other thing. The other reason I came by. Our situation. It’s not simple, is it?”

“I missed you,” I said.

“I missed you, too. Still do. But…”

“There has to be a ‘but.’ ”

“Don’t be angry.”

“I’m not. I’m sad.”

“I am, too. If I didn’t care about you, I’d have spared myself seeing you. Still, I’m not staying, Alex. A car is coming by to take me back to the airport and I’m rejoining the tour and remaining till the end. Which may stretch longer. We’ve been doing great, raising a bundle for the cause. There’s been talk of a European extension.”

“Paris?” I said.

She began to cry.

I would’ve liked to join in, but there was no juice left in me.