Bad Blood (33 page)

In Lydia’s room the lights were out, leaving the room to settle softly into the purple dusk. I stood silently by the bed, sipped my coffee, watched the bedclothes rise and fall with the gentle rhythm of Lydia’s breathing. The white bandage around her head made her features look delicate, her face small and vulnerable. She’d hate to know I was even thinking that.

When my coffee was almost gone Lydia’s eyelids fluttered, opened, closed again.

“Bill?” Her voice was faint.

“I’m here.”

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

“Thank God,” she breathed. “Now go to hell.”

“Lydia—”

“Passwords, for God’s sake.” I leaned to hear her better. “‘It’s only a game.’ I almost broke my neck climbing down that cliff. You smell like a brewery.”

“Distillery.”

“Go to hell,” she whispered again.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“No, you’re not. You’re standing there thinking how very clever you are, how you managed to save everybody after all.”

Not everybody, I thought. In the twilight I saw MacGregor’s ashen face.

I stood silent, not knowing what to say. She was silent too, and for a while I thought she was asleep. Then, her eyes still closed, she slipped her hand from beneath the blanket, found mine. I closed my tingling fingers around her small, soft ones.

“Bill?”

“It’s okay. You’ll be okay.”

The sky outside the window faded slowly to black. I stood holding Lydia’s hand until the soft rhythm of her breathing told me she was asleep again, and for a long time after that.

When I left Lydia I took the elevator again, this time to the third floor, to Tony’s room. In here the lights were on, but Tony was asleep, his face pale and, even in sleep, reflecting pain.

Suddenly deeply weary, I pulled a chair next to the bed, leaned forward in it. I spoke Tony’s name once, twice. His lips moved, without sound; then his eyelids rose slowly. He looked blankly around. “Tony,” I said again. With an effort, his eyes found mine.

“Smith.” His whisper was almost inaudible.

“Don’t talk,” I said. “Just listen. I came to tell you it’s over. Jimmy didn’t kill anyone, Tony. Ginny Sanderson— the little blond girl—Ginny Sanderson killed Wally Gould and Frank Grice killed Ginny Sanderson. Tony, do you understand what I’m saying?”

He moved his head minutely, a nod. “Blood,” he whispered. Pain shadowed his face. “All over everything.”

“Uh-huh. But Jimmy wasn’t involved in any of it. Any of it, Tony. He ran because he was scared. He didn’t have the keys and he didn’t have the truck. Do you understand?”

“The truck,” he whispered. “I was followin’ the truck.”

“I know, Tony. Don’t talk, don’t tell me. All right? What Frank told you about Jimmy—he told you about Eve’s burglary, right? That night at the bar? He said Jimmy did that, that he could prove it, he could get Jimmy sent away for a long time? It wasn’t true.

“Jimmy told you he was going straight. That was true. He’s clean, Tony. He had nothing to do with the burglary, he had nothing to do with the murders. Tony, don’t talk,” I said again, as he tried to speak. His mouth closed; he watched me.

“Grice is dead. Jimmy messed things up a little trying to protect Ginny Sanderson, but it probably would’ve come out the same anyway. He saved my life, Tony, just like you did.

“Those bullets you took, they were meant for me. From one of Grice’s boys.” I stood. “That’s what I came to say, Tony.”

“Smith—”

“No,” I said. “I don’t want to hear it. Rest. You need to
rest
, Tony. You’ll be all right, but it’ll take time.” We looked at each other in silence for a few moments. Then I said, “I’ll see you, Tony,” and I left.

Eve Colgate was waiting in the lobby when I got downstairs, but so was Brinkman.

“I got to talk to you, city boy.”

“Jesus, Brinkman, can it wait until tomorrow? I’m a wreck.”

“No. Now.”

Eve put her hand on my arm. “I’ll wait outside. I’m tired of this place.” She turned to Brinkman. “I’d appreciate it if you kept it short, Sheriff.” She walked out the smoky glass doors.

Brinkman watched her go. “‘I’d appreciate it . . .’ Shit.”

“What the hell do you want, Brinkman?” I sat, exhausted.

“I’ve been talking to Otis Huttner. He’s going to live. He’s not even hurt bad.”

“Great. Can I go now?”

“He says everything you said is true, except he claims he didn’t know a goddamn thing about Lena until after it was over.”

“Uh-huh, sure. And?”

“And he says the cop Sanderson bought Grice was Ron MacGregor.”

I rubbed my eyes. Flashes of red and yellow played behind my lids.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me that, Smith?”

I thought of saying I didn’t know, but I had nothing left for that kind of show. And there was something more
important
, so I said that instead. “Brinkman, does it have to come out?”

“What the hell are you talking about? I’d’ve had Grice years ago, except for that bastard! I don’t—”

“Brinkman, look. Grice is dead. MacGregor’s dead. Any organization Grice built you’ll be able to take apart pretty easily now, and it probably doesn’t amount to much anyhow.

“But I don’t think you’re going to get much else out of this. You might get Sanderson for the murder of his wife, but you’ll have to drain the quarry pit to find her, and I don’t think you’ll have enough to go to court on, even if you do that.

“So pretty much it’s over. You’ll give press interviews and get reelected. The DA and NYSEG and the Feds, and whoever else wants to, will start investigations into Appleseed Holdings. Sanderson’s pet politicians will suddenly lose his phone number. He’ll be nobody in this county anymore, but he won’t go to jail.

“And Ron MacGregor will get buried, but as a hero, Brinkman. That’s what his family thinks. That’s what everybody thinks. What the hell good is it going to do anybody, if the truth comes out?”

Brinkman’s small eyes fixed on me for a long time. “You’re just so goddamn smart, aren’t you, city boy? You can just tell what’s good for everybody, and how everything oughta work.”

“No,” I said, standing. “If I were smart, I could make things come out the way they should, instead of being left behind to clean up the mess.”

I turned away from him, followed Eve Colgate out the gray glass doors.

In the car I told Eve the story from the beginning. I told her more than I’d told Brinkman, because the paintings were hers; but the part I’d kept from him I kept from her also.

I found myself telling her about MacGregor, though, which was something else I had decided not to talk about. But I needed to talk about it.

“I didn’t catch on.” I said. “At first he just told me to keep out of his way. He was a cop; that’s standard. And he started asking me why I thought Brinkman, with such a grudge on, hadn’t been able to get at Grice. I wondered why he was asking me. But he was fishing, looking to see if I’d figured out Grice had protection. And I had, but I wasn’t smart enough to see where it was coming from.

“Then suddenly he was ordering me off the case, out of the county, pissed off, as though I’d done something. I guess that was when he found out Grice really was involved and trying to set Jimmy up. He was afraid I’d get too close. He wanted to protect me. And I didn’t get it.”

“He was a friend of yours,” she said. “You trusted him, and he couldn’t afford to trust you. What would you have done, if you’d known?”

“I don’t know. Honest to God, I don’t know.”

We rode in silence for a time, back over the route we’d taken last night with Tony. The night seemed very quiet, very dark.

“That little girl,” Eve said at last. “Do you think she really did that?”

“Shot Gould? Yes. If Grice had done it he’d’ve been proud. He wouldn’t have manufactured a story, at least not for me. Yes, I think that was true.”

There was more silence, more narrow, curving road, the smell of damp earth and woodsmoke in the air.

“Eve?”

“Yes?”

“I want to know something. You told me it was none of my business once, but I’m asking again. What’s behind your arrangement with your gallery?”

She didn’t answer for some time. Finally she said, “You have to have all the pieces, don’t you? That’s what drives you.”

“That’s part of it,” I said. “Part of it.”

She shifted, turned onto 30. Her driving was smooth and sure, even in my unfamiliar car.

“I told you,” she said, “how my husband died. In a car accident. I was driving; we had both been drinking. I didn’t tell you why.” A pause; then, “Henri had just told me he’d made another woman pregnant.”

She didn’t look at me. I said, “Someone up here?”

“Yes. He’d been seeing her for over a year. I didn’t understand it then, and I don’t now. I thought we had . . . I thought . . . my God, how I loved him!” Her voice quavered. “And so I killed him. I don’t think I meant to. I don’t think so. But I don’t think I’ll ever know.

“Henri’s daughter was born not long after I got out of the hospital. Her mother, Henri’s . . . Henri’s mistress . . .
she
wasn’t a tramp. She ran a plant nursery. She was older than I, as Henri was. Smart, kind, and strong.

“She never knew who I was. I used to go to the nursery regularly. My cherry trees are from it. I watched the child grow.”

The night had grown foggy as 30 climbed into the hills. I shivered slightly in the clammy air.

“I tried, through Ulrich, to give her money for the child. She knew it was from Henri’s widow; she turned it down. But when the child was ready for school, she found she had a dilemma.

“We had gotten to be friends, of a sort. I don’t know if you’ll understand that . . .” For the first time, she glanced at me.

I said, “Yes. Yes, I do.” In the darkness I couldn’t see her eyes.

She nodded, went on. “She wanted the child to be educated well. She told me she had promised the child’s father that. She told me—she said she had loved him very much.” Eve drew a breath. “But the public schools here were not good. The only nearby private school was Adirondack Preparatory, which at that time was just a finishing school. There was no other place to send her daughter close to home, and she couldn’t bear to send her away.

“And at last I had found something I could do. I made arrangments with Ulrich. On my behalf, he met with the trustees at Adirondack Preparatory. In the beginning I endowed chairs. I sponsored scholarships. I donated a new building, for the visual and performing arts.

“Eventually, as happens, my money attracted more money. Other people began sending their daughters there, and giving generously.

“By the time Henri’s daughter was ready to enter the fifth grade, Adirondack had changed a great deal. She was sent there on a scholarship; she did quite well. She went on to college, and to medical school. She lives in New York now. I look her up when I go in, an old friend of her mother’s.

“I’ve continued to support the school, and the answer to your question is that that’s where my money goes. I’m not alone anymore in this, so now I concentrate my efforts in two areas: I sponsor a number of scholarships, and I underwrite Adirondack’s programs in the visual arts.”

The road curved, straightened again at a place where, in daylight, the view stretched fifty miles. Now there was only blackness, and distant lights.

“Do you see,” she asked, “why I was unhappy with Lydia’s prying into this? I knew it was unrelated to the burglary. And I had kept it secret for so long.”

“Yes,” I said. “I do see. And thank you for telling me. I know it was hard.”

She surprised me with a wry smile. “Telling you wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be.”

I hesitated, said, “Eve? Who chooses the scholarship recipients?”

She threw me another glance, said, “There’s a panel. They have certain criteria. Occasionally I recommend someone. I don’t abuse my position and my candidates are never turned down. Why?”

“MacGregor’s girls go to Adirondack,” I said. “His arrangment with Grice was paying their tuition. That’s what it was all about, his girls.”

Eve said, “And you want me to make sure they can continue? You want to do that for him, even now?”

“Especially now. It’s what he sold his soul for.”

We spoke very little after that, as we covered the dark miles. I lit a cigarette and stared out the window and thought about Eve educating two generations of girls, other people’s daughters, helping them to see so much, and so clearly, that in the end a nursery woman’s daughter becomes a doctor, and a wild fifteen-year-old can identify, with certainty, unsigned canvases no one has ever seen before.

22

EVE UNLOCKED MY
cabin door, came in long enough to turn the light on in the front room. Her eyes fell on the piano, which gleamed softly. “I am sorry,” she said, “that you won’t let me hear you play.” She smiled her small smile, studied me. “I imagine you’re quite good.”

“No. I’m not.”

She smiled again, didn’t answer.

Her eyes swept over the room, came back to me. “Are you sure you’ll be all right?”

“Yes,” I said. “Now that I’m here.”

“Then I’ll leave you here. Do you want me to come in the morning with your car?”

“No. I’ll find my way over tomorrow. Thank you, Eve.”

She took my hand, held it a moment. Then she turned and left.

I worked my way out of my jacket, found a glass and the bourbon bottle. I needed music, and I knew what I wanted: ensembled playing. Music made when people know each other, can canticipate and understand each other. I put on Beethoven, the Archduke Trio. I stretched out on the couch, sipped at the bourbon, felt the music flow around me. The soloistic, separate parts of the trio wove, danced, glided forward and back, created together what none of them was, alone.

It was an illusion, but it was beautiful.

I slept until one the next afternoon. Sometimes after the music was over and the bourbon was gone I’d made my way into bed, and after that I was aware of nothing except the strange, sad images of my dreams.

When I awoke I was aching and stiff. My head hurt, but not as badly as the day before, not as badly as I’d expected. I stumbled to the outer room, clicked on the hot water, built a fire, put the kettle on. The day was gray again, silent, but with an expectation in the air.