Chat (16 page)
“This is why I took the place, even though the rent was more than I wanted.”
It was a beautiful room, with hardwood floors and detailed window frames, a coffered ceiling, elaborate moldings, and gleaming antique fixtures. Along the narrow wall, under an intricate mantel, was a built-in wood stove with glass doors, currently alive with a robust fire. The warmth of it all, both physical and psychological, surrounded them both in an embrace.
“Holy smokes,” he said, looking around, reaching out to stroke the hardwood door frame beside him. “It’s like a museum.”
She groaned good-naturedly. “Yeah—of the wrong century, since all my junk is a museum to the eighties.”
He saw her point. The setting was deserving of antique knickknacks, overstuffed English furniture, and framed oil paintings. Her belongings, though attractive and comfortable-looking, clearly harkened to a different era.
“Maybe,” he didn’t argue, “but it’s not like you have beanbags and cinder-block shelves.”
In fact, she’d done wonders. With all packing materials banished to the room they’d just left, the furniture and rugs had been more or less permanently placed, over half the hangings were already on the walls, and even a few stand-arounds had been distributed along windowsills and shelves.
“You’ve made it feel like a home,” he told her honestly.
Her smile broadened. “Yeah. That’s what I was thinking. It kind of works.” She waved with a flourish at an oversize armchair near the fire. “Have a seat. Would you like something to drink? Or maybe some tea?”
He hesitated, embarrassed that he’d come by unannounced and caused a commotion, but he yielded to her obvious good mood. “Sure. Tea would be great.”
“Deal,” she said. “Sit there. The kitchen’s still a wreck, so it’s better I go there alone. Be back in a sec.”
He watched her vanish through a side door leading to a hallway. Suddenly alone, he eyed the armchair momentarily but yielded to taking a small tour of the photographs newly on the walls and lining the baseboards, still awaiting hanging.
Some were family pictures in which he thought he could see, in the freckled face of a laughing child, the woman he was beginning to know, surrounded by a tired-looking mother, two older brothers, and a dark-complected father with a thick mustache, rough hands, and a steady, unsmiling look to his eyes. The pictures, taken at picnics, a restaurant, and—one—on a small, weather-beaten fishing boat, were snapshots only, slightly blurry, the color fading, and, despite their careful mounting and framing, eloquent of an economically marginal existence.
Most of the newer pictures were of a different young girl growing up. She was accompanied by a handsome, distracted-looking man in the early shots only, and then alone or with Lyn. These mother-daughter shots tended to show Lyn with the watchful look of the novice photographer, wondering if the camera’s self-timer was going to work—suggesting there was no one either behind the camera or in their lives.
Joe studied the ascent of the child through grade school and puberty, as caught on stage, in a cheerleader’s outfit, at the high school prom, and at the desk of what looked like a newspaper office, where she was gazing perplexedly at a computer screen. She was a pretty girl with long hair, slim like her mother.
“That’s Coryn,” Lyn said from behind him.
He turned and saw her standing by the open door to the hallway, two mugs on a small tray in one hand—a practiced stance for someone used to delivering drinks and snacks to tables.
“She’s very pretty,” he said, crossing over to take the tray and set it on a coffee table between the armchair and the sofa, by the fire.
“Pretty,” her mother agreed. “Also smart, stubborn, opinionated, and private. I love that child like nothing else on earth, but I’m not so sure I’ll ever figure out what makes her tick.”
“Gave you some troubles over the years?” he asked.
Her answer surprised him. “Never. A completely even keel. Everybody kept expecting her to flip out, especially as a teenager, only because she was so steady, we all assumed she was building up for a huge blow. But it never happened. She’s twenty-three now. I don’t think it’s going to happen.”
Lyn sat in the middle of the sofa. Also on the tray were small containers of milk and sugar. “What do you take in your tea?”
He took the armchair opposite and chuckled at the question. “A little of both will work.”
But she paused. “You’re hedging somehow. How do you usually take it?”
“You’re going to think it’s like a bad Vermont advertisement. But if there’s a choice, I put maple syrup in with the milk.”
She immediately rose and headed back toward the kitchen. “I have some, right out in the open. Won’t take a second.”
She was back in almost that time, unscrewing a glass bottle as she entered. “This I’ve got to try. I love maple syrup, but I’ve never tried it in tea.”
“Coffee, too,” he said, adding, “but I may be alone there. Nobody else I know does that.”
She sat again and prepared the mugs, smiling up at him. “You’ve got a sweet tooth.”
He accepted the proffered mug. “Yeah, I’ve been told that.” He took a sip. “Perfect.”
She tried her own and nodded approvingly. “That’s great. I wouldn’t have guessed.”
“Where’s Coryn now?” he asked, settling into the armchair’s embrace, enjoying watching her on the sofa.
“She works for some newspaper in Boston, learning the ropes and hoping for something bigger soon.”
“The
Globe
?”
Lyn shrugged. “No—
that
she would’ve mentioned. I did ask her, but that’s what I meant. She keeps her own counsel. For all I know, she’ll be calling me tomorrow from the
L.A. Times
. I hope not, though. I would really miss her.”
“You see a lot of each other?”
“Not as much as a mother would like, but we talk on the phone pretty often.”
“Is she it for your family?” he asked, nodding toward the photographs.
Lyn gazed in that direction, as if the subjects pictured had suddenly stepped into the room, which, after a fashion, they had. Joe kept his eyes on her. He had always enjoyed watching her, from the first time he’d seen her. She had a magnetic effect on him that he was only now beginning to appreciate.
“No,” she answered quietly. “I have my mom and a brother, Steve.”
“The other boy in the picture isn’t a brother?”
She nodded slowly, still gazing off. “He was. He and my father died at sea.”
He was taken aback, and felt badly for leading her there. “I’m sorry.”
She turned toward him again, her expression sad but open. “I am, too. I loved them both, in different ways. José was wild and funny and full of beans; my father was just the opposite. A rock. I see a lot of Dad in Coryn—both of them so steady. Losing them pretty much kicked my family in the head. Steve and my mom never recovered.”
“Where are they now?” Joe asked softy.
“Mom still lives in Gloucester,” she said briefly.
He considered asking more but realized that either it wouldn’t matter or that he’d find out later on. He hoped for the latter, if only because it meant some future for the two of them.
“Steve’s in jail,” she then added, almost as a challenge.
“Ouch,” he reacted. “That’s tough. I see what you mean—did all that start after the boat went down?”
She looked at him in silence for a couple of seconds, her mug cradled in her lap. “I guess that’s right,” she then said. “You’re used to these sob stories.”
She hadn’t said it harshly, but he answered with care nevertheless, feeling his way. “They aren’t sob stories, but I wish they were more rare.”
She nodded silently and took a meditative sip of her tea. “I’m sorry,” she murmured afterward.
“For what?”
“That all came out wrong. My dad and José died years ago, when I was still in my teens. It’s not like it’s fresh—or how Mom and Steve turned out. I don’t know why I threw it at you like that.”
“No damage done. We’ve got to get to know each other somehow. It won’t always be just right.”
“Is it right, though?” she asked. “So far? I don’t want to come across as someone I’m not—including how I just showed up out of the blue.”
“It feels right to me,” he told her simply. “You said from the start where you stood.” He laughed before adding, “And that it was basically nowhere in particular. I can live with that. I’m not without my own complications.”
Her hand suddenly flew to her forehead. “Jesus,” she said, “that’s right. How are they doing?”
He smiled back at her, wishing that were the extent of it. “I didn’t actually mean that, but they’re fine, or at least Mom is, physically, and Leo is still stable.”
“But she’s taking it hard,” Lyn suggested.
“They’re very close,” he answered.
She got that distant look back into her eyes. “So were Dad and José.”
“It was a storm?” he asked after a moment of silence.
“Yeah. I almost wish it was something more dramatic, like in that George Clooney movie. But it was just run-of-the-mill, a carbon copy of all the other storms that kill fishermen year after year.”
“Did they ever find them?”
“Not them, not the boat. Nothing.”
He stared at the fire for a while, reflecting how much harder that must have made it for the survivors, never knowing for sure what had happened.
“God, what a life,” he finally muttered.
“How come neither you nor Leo ever got married?” she asked after a while.
“I did,” he answered, his eyes still on the flames. “A long, long time ago. She died of cancer. We never had kids.”
“What was her name?”
“Ellen,” he said, letting the name drift around inside his head like a childhood prayer, never to be forgotten. “I didn’t feel like getting married again after that.”
He finally shifted his gaze to her. “What about you and Coryn’s dad?”
Lyn half smiled. “Nothing quite so romantic. We were no match made in heaven. Barely lasted three years. He stuck around for Coryn for a while after that; then he lost interest. Neither one of us has heard from him in years.”
“You still have his photo.”
She glanced across the room. “Yeah, well . . .” She left her thought unspoken.
Joe drained his mug, placed it on the coffee table, and stood up. “Guess I better get going.”
She stood also. “You down here because of those two dead men I saw in the paper?”
“Yeah.”
“Is it bad?”
He smiled slightly. “Right now it’s just confusing. Might get bad, though. We’ve only started digging.”
She escorted him to the pocket doors and out into the cooler, darkened room beyond. “I open next Friday, if you’re going to be around.”
He cast her a look and draped his hand on her shoulder, enjoying the warmth of her through her shirt. “I can rarely make promises with my schedule, but I’d love to be there. What time?”
“I open at six, but things probably won’t warm up till nine or later.”
“You expecting a crowd?”
“God, I hope so. It would be a killer to have nobody show up on opening night. I’ve been spreading the word the best I know how, but in the end . . .”
He retrieved his coat from where he’d dropped it onto a nearby box, and opened the door to the landing before turning to face her. Now he placed both his hands on her shoulders. “You are so good at what you do, Lyn. I don’t think you have anything to worry about.”
She took advantage of his gesture to step into his arms and give him a hug. “Thanks, Joe. I hope you can make it, but I’ll understand if you can’t.”
He leaned back enough to look down at her. Under his open hands, he felt where her ribs came in to join her spine, just above her waist, and briefly imagined what it might be like to have only bare skin to explore.
“I’ll try my best,” he murmured, and kissed her, feeling her lips softening under his, then parting to let him in for the first time. His hands moved up her back, taking inventory, discovering that she wasn’t wearing a brassiere.
He enjoyed her body being pressed up against his, and hoped this would eventually lead to where, he now realized, he was finally ready to go.
“This is nice,” he said softly as they broke apart.
“For me, too,” she whispered. “Come back whenever you want.
JMAN:
U hav a bf?
Mandi144:
no. had 1. loser
JMAN:
Y?
Mandi144:
2 yung
JMAN:
for wat?
Mandi144:
wat do u think?
JMAN:
u r hot
Mandi144:
I feel hot
JMAN:
wanna do something about it?
Mandi144:
duh
JMAN:
Where in Vermont?
Mandi144:
Brattleboro. U?
JMAN:
not far – Erving
Mandi144:
kool. U sur Im not 2 yung 4 u?
JMAN:
ur just rite
W
illy slouched down in his battered pickup truck and pulled his soiled wool cap farther down above his eyes. Across the parking lot, barely visible under the single light over the bar’s entrance, the famed E. T. Griffis, a bulky, big-bellied man in insulated overalls and unlaced snowmobile boots, slowly got out of a vehicle much like Willy’s and shuffled across the hard-packed snow toward the door, greeting an exiting patron with a joke and a laugh before vanishing inside.
Willy bided his time, waiting for the second man to get into his car and leave, before entering the freezing night air himself and heading for the bar.
It was about what he was expecting—crowded, noisy, none too clean, and filled with the kind of people he’d come to see as extended family. For decor, the walls were lined with hubcaps, and the windowsills with empty bottles. The thin carpeting crunched underfoot with debris. It was the type of bar Willy had called home for years before realizing, at the very last minute—and with Joe’s then much resented help—that he was facing an alcoholic’s version of suicide.
He selected a spot at the end of the bar, near where E. T. had planted himself between two similar-looking men, who were still greeting him. They weren’t effusive in style, reminding Willy of a pair of walruses congenially making room for one of their own, but there was an element of respect, as well. True, E. T. was visibly older than his mates, but, outward appearances notwithstanding, he was being awarded a muted homage for his elevated social status.
Willy wasn’t surprised. Before he’d headed up here—he was in the Thetford area’s primary workingman’s bar—not only had Joe briefed him on E. T.’s history and neighborhood standing, but Willy had spent a few days on his own, soaking up all he could of the man’s lore and legend. The resulting portrait had been familiar. In most communities, there was some equivalent of E. T. Griffis—a man who, through hard work, reputation, money, or a combination of all three, had established himself as an icon of some sort. Usually, this archetype was a man with working-class roots, an easy way with his peers, and enough money that when the occasional deserving local hit a rough patch, he or she might be eased through it by a loan or gift that never went advertised but was somehow made known. Willy, born and bred in New York City, where he’d also briefly been a beat cop, had first met these pseudo paternal types as neighborhood gang leaders or mob subcaptains, feeding as much off the social glow as off the fear that had struck its match. There had also been a few that might have been termed non-“connected,” truly benevolent dons, but they had been harder to find, mostly because of the circles in which Willy had traveled.
Here, in Vermont, this latter, benign phenomenon prevailed, although Willy was still, all these years later, trying to suppress a natural suspicion that the likes of E. T. Griffis were treated as they were because of some hold they had over their cohorts and admirers.
Willy had acquired his cynicism the hard way.
The bartender, a thin, tall man with glasses and a blank expression, placed an unordered glass of what looked like scotch before E. T. and, then, paused in front of Willy.
“What’ll it be?”
“Ginger ale.”
The barkeep turned away without comment, but Willy caught the glances from those within earshot, including E. T. A stranger didn’t come into a bar and order a soft drink unless he was a teetotaler, which wouldn’t make much sense, or a cop.
The bartender returned thirty seconds later with a glass, which he placed on a coaster. “Two bucks.”
Willy took a few crumpled bills out of his stained barn coat pocket, separated the money from some old receipts, two rubber bands, and an assortment of small bolts and washers, and paid the man.
Willy waited until the barkeep had turned his back, and then reached into another, inner pocket, extracted a small bottle of amber fluid—actually tea—and poured a generous dollop into the drink. The flask bottle vanished as quickly as it had appeared, but not before the same onlookers had seen the quick and practiced gesture. Comforted by both the supposed alcohol’s surreptitious appearance and its owner’s seeming need to watch his expenses, the others at the bar allowed their suspicions to be lulled.
He left his subtle communication at that, pretending to focus on his drink and the numbing comfort it promised, while in fact eavesdropping on the conversation around E. T.
This wasn’t terribly difficult. Both its volume and its content made for easy listening. In essence, it was the same “guy talk” that Willy had listened to and participated in his entire drinking life, dealing with, in no particular order, engines, guns, dogs, women, a touch of politics, and how to use the word “fuck” as many times, and in as many ways, as possible. It was all as soothing, complex, and subtle as it was outwardly moronic, simple-minded, and gross—a distinctly male medley that was routinely dismissed by most women and academics.
And which made Willy, in a moment’s distraction, think of Sammie Martens. As his companion of several years by now, she would not have fit into those judgmental categories—a character trait he valued greatly, not that he’d ever admit it. She was as highly tempered, competitive, and driven as he, and as good at holding her ground. This secondhand conversation would have been a natural for her to consider, had she been here, and one she could have joined at any point.
Not that she was hard or vulgar. In fact, it was her contradictory femininity that most attracted him. It remained his particular secret—as was his inability to tell her—that he found her attractive, endearing, funny, smart, and a terrific cop to boot.
None of which had anything to do with where he was at the moment, except that by the time an outburst of laughter snapped him out of his reverie, he realized that he was on his third bogus drink and had been here for over an hour.
He gazed across at his reason for being here, having subconsciously tracked the entire conversation. He’d noticed that Griffis had participated halfheartedly only, as if his appearance had been stimulated less by pleasure and more by social obligation—a byproduct of being a local celebrity. Griffis was listening to one last story with a fixed smile on his face, while slowly pulling his wallet from the back pocket of his green work pants. Willy took this as his cue to simply leave some change as a tip and head out the door for the parking lot, the next step of his plan in motion.
Walking seemingly without care, Willy checked the empty lot for any movement, crossed over to E. T.’s parked truck, quickly bent over and stabbed its front tire with a small knife, and then veered left toward his own vehicle, all in one fluid arc.
There, he started the engine with his headlights off and waited, hoping that his reading of the social mores inside was correct, and that Griffis would be allowed to leave alone by his harder-drinking buddies.
All self-confidence aside, Willy was nevertheless relieved when Griffis did emerge on his own and worked his way slowly—even sadly, Willy thought—to his truck.
He pulled himself up behind the steering wheel, oblivious to the leaking tire, turned on the ignition, and lumbered out of the parking lot with Willy in slow and distant pursuit.
Less than two miles up the road, E. T.’s truck eased over to the side, its brake lights signaling Willy’s efficiency.
Willy slowly drew abreast, idling in the middle of the deserted road.
“Great night for that,” he observed, looking at the tire.
“No shit,” Griffis said, already out of his truck and taking in the damage. “Doesn’t make sense.”
“Never does. You got a spare?”
Griffis sighed. “Of course not.”
“Too cold to change it tonight, anyhow,” Willy commented. “Be easier to deal with it in the morning. Wanna lift?”
E. T. straightened slightly and eyed him more carefully, distracted from his tire, taking in this strange person’s gaunt, unshaven face, hollow eyes, and that odd, dangling arm he’d noticed earlier inside. “You were in the bar.”
“Yeah. Butch Watters,” Willy said, adding, “You’re E. T. Griffis.”
Griffis straightened slightly. “I know you?”
Willy began applying his homework. “Nah. I drove a rig for Bud Wheeler a while back, in Bradford, right before you put him out of business by buying that gravel pit he used. Best thing that ever happened.”
“You didn’t get along with Bud?”
Willy laughed. “Nobody got along with Bud. I did worse than most.”
“What’re you doin’ down here?”
Willy pulled out his local trump card. “I’m staying with the Mackies on Five Corners Road. Don and I . . .” he paused tellingly before adding, “were in the service together. I’m sort of between things right now.”
He made sure to keep his voice flat, unemotional, matching his appearance, as if uninterested in what he was saying. In fact, he was all but holding his breath, hoping the cover Gunther had set up for him with the Mackies would provide the nudge he needed.
It helped, at least, implying that maybe Don and Sue Mackie
were
the neighborhood stalwarts—and old friends—that Joe had made them out to be. Either that, or E. T. had read between the lines of Willy’s inference of a war wound.
In any case, the older man seemed to soften his natural suspicion. “I oughta just call one of my guys out to take care of this.”
But Willy could tell the fish was almost inside the boat. He let his pickup slip forward a foot. “Suit yourself. It’s your butt to freeze off.” He then asked a question his research had already answered. “You got a cell phone?”
E. T. shook his head stubbornly. “Nah. Stupid things. Probably wouldn’t work anyhow.”
“I can take you back to the bar,” Willy offered. “Seems kinda dumb, if you’re already half home.”
That clearly did it. The older man finally nodded.
“Right,” he said. “I guess I could do with a ride. Get my kid on this tomorrow.”
Willy nodded without comment, feeding into the traditional New England version of a conversation, where the less you say, the less you have to explain later, not to mention that it’s nobody’s business anyway.
“Where to?” Willy asked, as Griffis climbed on board.
“Right. Up to the top, then left. I’ll show you from there.”
After he approvingly watched Willy negotiate the steering wheel one-handed, E. T. stared out the front of the old truck’s smeared windshield.
“Sue still have that cold?”
“Pneumonia,” Willy said shortly to pass the obvious test. He doubted Griffis cared one way or the other about Sue Mackie’s health. “Antibiotics. Guess they’re working.”
“Not from around here.”
No shit, Willy felt like saying. “New York.”
That brought a brief stare. “City?”
“Yeah. Been bumming around a lot lately, though—like working with Wheeler.”
The truck was grinding uphill, lumbering to overtake the feeble reach of its own headlights.
“New York’s a long ways.”
Christ, Willy thought. This was going to take a while.
“Figured this would be a better place to die,” he said, risking a little melodrama in the hopes of speeding things up.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Griffis push his lips out thoughtfully.
“The Mackies know about that?” his passenger asked.
“They know what happened,” Willy answered obliquely, nevertheless impressed by E. T.’s practical handling of his statement.
E. T. seemed to accept that and didn’t speak until the truck had reached the top of the hill, when he repeated, “Left here.”
After a few more minutes, during which Willy could almost hear E. T. arguing with himself, he’d been put in such an awkward spot, Willy took him off the hook with “I had a car crash. Fucked myself up, killed my son. I was drunk.”
Both the wording and the tone had been carefully chosen—not so terse as to cut off further conversation, not so confessional that it was best not to ask. Just the facts, but sentimentally evocative enough to get the old man thinking of his own losses.
Willy waited patiently, the heavily shadowed snowbanks to both sides of them slipping past like discarded bundles of laundry.
“That’s tough,” Griffis finally said heavily. “Know the feeling.”
Willy didn’t doubt it. Not only had he played to E. T.’s recent loss of Andy, but he knew Griffis as a fellow alcoholic—only a nonrecovering one.
“You, too?” he asked open-endedly.
E. T. bit. “Yeah. My youngest. Hung himself.”
Willy thought of Sammie again but didn’t correct the other man’s grammar. Instead, he faked a theatrical double take. “No shit? A woman, right? It usually is.”
But he’d gotten as much as he was going to for the moment.
“Nah,” E. T. said under his breath, eyes fixed ahead.
Willy let it be. “I can’t get it out of my head, especially with this to remind me.” He hefted his useless arm’s shoulder. “How do you live with it?” he asked after a pause, trying a different tack, knowing he might be pushing too hard. In truth, it wasn’t that important to him. He was doing Joe a favor, it got him out of the office and on his own, and he had nothing to lose if he ended up empty-handed. He could take risks.
But, as if E. T. were eavesdropping and not wanting Willy to betray his boss, the older man met him halfway with “I have another son.”
Willy nodded. “Guess that would help.”
He hoped it didn’t, given Joe’s suspicions about why Andy had copped to a crime he’d never committed.
E. T.’s monotone response opened that door wider. “Not even close.”
Willy smiled slightly in the darkness. I got you now, he thought.
Willy approached the farmhouse on foot, having parked at the bottom of the long driveway. This was a pure impulse, driven solely by nosiness. He could have called Joe or paged him, or even waited until morning to report on his purely social meeting with E. T. He’d just spent an hour with the old man at his home over a nightcap, further ingratiating himself. But he wasn’t interested in seeing Joe—it was the serendipitous proximity of the Gunther farm that had become an irresistible attraction. Willy had heard too much about Mom and Leo and the farm and all the rest not to make at least a covert visit. In a way he couldn’t—and certainly wouldn’t—have verbalized, it had much of the appeal of catching an eminent presence during an unguarded, private moment.