Dial M for Meat Loaf (22 page)

41

“We can work this out,” Deputy Sheriff Doug said, following Plato down the hospital corridor. “I know we can.”

“Leave me alone.”

“I realize you’re upset with your father. Who wouldn’t be? Look, we’ve got a psychologist outside. He wants to talk to you.”

“I don’t want to talk to him.”

“But he says he can help you. He’s sure of it.” Wasn’t that
it
in a nutshell? thought Plato. Optimism. The belief that wrongs could be righted, problems could be solved. At a time like this, optimism was just one more burden.

“You can’t get away, you know. We’ve got the entire hospital surrounded.” Doug glanced at the detonation device in Plato’s hand.

All the way down in the elevator, the officer continued his patter. By the time they reached the glass front doors, Plato had a splitting headache. The sun was already white hot. Police were everywhere. People were running around; some had stopped to gawk. Car fumes choked Plato’s throat. “I just want to be left alone.”

“We can’t allow that.”

“You can allow anything I damn well please. I’m the one with the dynamite, Doug.”

Just then, two teenage girls rushed around the side of the building. They were giggling, acting like they’d just heard a big joke. An officer across the street hollered for them to stop, to get back. But it was too late. Plato grabbed the smaller one and jammed her against his chest. Doug drew his gun, but he didn’t fire. He couldn’t.

Plato guided the girl toward his car and told her to get in. As everyone watched in abject horror, Plato eased into the driver’s seat and rolled down the window. “Leave me alone and nothing will happen to—” He looked at the girl. “What’s your name?”

“Brittany,” she said, her eyes round with terror, her body pressed to the door, cowering.

“There you have it. Brittany. Leave us the hell alone and she won’t get hurt!” He started the motor, then burned rubber. Glancing in his rearview mirror, he yelled “Damn it all!” when he saw that he was being followed.

Twenty minutes later, Plato and Brittany were inside his barn. He used an old rope to tie the teenager’s hands and feet, and he slapped a piece of duct tape across her mouth to shut her up. Finally, he stowed her behind the baled hay. Speaking very slowly and clearly, he promised he wouldn’t hurt her. Once he decided what to do, he’d let her go. But she had to stay until then because otherwise, there was no telling what the police would do.

Astrid was still in the barn. Plato led her out of her stall, sidestepping the cow dung, then dragged a barrel over next to her and sat down. He needed time to think. Astrid would help him figure it all out. Her big brown eyes blinked their sweetness at him. Her unconditional love enveloped him.

“Oh, hey,” he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out an Oreo. “I brought this for you. Here,” he said tenderly, feeding it to her, then petting her head. People thought cows were lumbering animals, dimwitted and smelly. Astrid might be a tad smelly, but she was also delicate. She bared her teeth ever so slightly as she took the cookie. She loved her Oreos, just like Plato did. It was kind of early in the morning for a cookie, he supposed, but then this was a special occasion. A party. Except, Plato couldn’t quite come up with the theme.

“The problem is, Astrid, you have to make so many important decisions in your life before you’re ready to make them. Like marriage. I was incredibly hot to marry my wife, but I was twenty years old. What the hell does a twenty-year-old know about life? How was I supposed to guess she’d turn into the Farmer in the Dell? Not that I’ve got anything against farm life, you understand. If I hadn’t come here, I would never have met you, but to be truthful, I don’t belong on a hobby farm. I hate the outdoors, hate tramping through the woods and dales. Give me a book and an easy chair any day.

“And then, there’s children. How did
they
happen? Well, I mean, I know how they happened, but . . . I don’t know them. They don’t know me. My wife and I are strangers. And nobody seems to notice except me. Or, if they do notice, they don’t care. We all just continue with our lives as if nothing’s wrong. But everything’s wrong, Astrid.”

Plato could smell the foul odor of car exhaust wafting in through the open door. He stomped over to look outside. Sure enough, squad cars had ringed the barn, but they were at least seventy-five yards away. They weren’t taking any chances.

Sharpshooters were standing by the trees, their rifles pointed at the barn door. A crowd was beginning to form, well behind the cars. All the bored townspeople were coming to watch a real-life drama as they sipped their morning coffee. Overhead, Plato could hear a helicopter. Scanning the assembly, he could pick out a few familiar faces. Sophie Greenway was there; so was his sister, Bernice, his uncle Milton, and his mother. Next to them, his wife was talking to a cop. They were all huddled together under an oak tree. His two sons stood about fifteen feet away, hands shielding their eyes from the sun’s glare, the better to witness their father’s demise.

As Plato continued to watch the voyeurs arrive, he noticed several vans pull in. Men scrambled out the back doors with handheld cameras and sound equipment.

“You should see this, Astrid. It’s like a county fair.” Just as he said the words, a minidonut truck drove in. “I’ll bet we’re live on CNN. Welcome to the twenty-first century, huh? Mass media can now capture a man’s mental collapse right on camera, as it happens, for all the world to see.”

Astrid mooed. With the acoustics in the new metal barn, it had a deep, metallic ring. She must want another cookie, thought Plato. He didn’t have one. If he could just get his hands on a package of those minidonuts, they’d both be happy.

Doug’s voice blasted through the air on a loudspeaker. “Plato, this is Deputy Sheriff Doug Elderberg.”

“I know who it is, asshole,” muttered Plato. “I didn’t figure Dan Rather was here yet.”

“We’ve got the place surrounded.”

“Gee, I never would have guessed.”

“Send Brittany out. You said yourself you didn’t want to hurt her. She’s just an innocent bystander.”

“Aren’t we all? No, I take that back. I’ve never been innocent. Maybe that’s my problem.”

“Plato, if you can hear me, make some sort of sign.”

Plato took off his right loafer and heaved it out into the sunlight.

“Good,” said Doug, a little dubiously. “Was that your shoe? Never mind.”

They couldn’t fire their rifles as long as the girl remained inside. Bringing her along had been a stroke of genius.

Plato returned to the barrel and sat back down. “You know what, Astrid? One day, this is going to be the great town anecdote. Where were you when that crazy Plato Washburn got cornered in his barn? ‘Why, I was there,’ the old men will say. ‘Saw the whole thing with my own two eyes. He was a freak, all right.’ ” Plato stopped, looking the cow full in the eyes. “But what’s the ending, Astrid? I can’t see it. What should I do? If I give myself up, I’ll go to jail for the rest of my life. I’m not sure I could stand that. It seems unlikely I could get out of the barn without getting shot. Unless I came up with a pretty amazing plan, that is. And I seem to be fresh out of plans.”

“Plato, this is Doug again. How you doin’ in there? We’ve got a man out here who wants to come in and talk to you. He’s unarmed. He won’t try anything funny, I promise. Like I said, he just wants to talk.”

Plato rushed to the door. “No way,” he shouted. “If he approaches the barn, I’ll blow the whole place up.”

“Okay, okay,” said Doug. “Maybe he can just talk to you on the loudspeaker.”

“I want to be alone! Go away!”

“We can’t. Not unless you send the girl out.”

“She’s the only thing keeping me alive. Do you think I’m an idiot?”

The crowd began to shout insults.

“Ill words butter no parsnips!” screamed Plato, huffing his way back to the barrel.

Astrid looked glum.

“Yeah, this is a mess. I won’t tell you what I’ve done ’cause you won’t like it.” One more being he could disappoint. But with Astrid, it was different. She didn’t
really
care, so she was safe.

“Plato Washburn?” A woman’s voice boomed over the din of the crowd. “This is Cora Runbeck. Where’s my cat?”

He grunted. The cat was the least of his worries.

“I kept my part of the bargain. Now you keep yours.”

The letters, thought Plato. With all the commotion, he’d forgotten about them. He hurried over to the wooden workbench, and pulled them out from under a box of gardening tools. “What am I going to do with these, Astrid?” Part of him wanted his mother to read them, to see just what kind of man she’d married, and part of him wanted to protect her. He took the letters and walked back to the barrel, slumping down on top of it. Deep inside, his heart felt like a wet, drippy piece of ice, melting not from the heat of the barn, but from the fire of his indecision.

“I’m melting,” he said to Astrid.

“I want my cat!” Cora hollered again.

“Oh, shut up, you old biddy.”

“Plato, it’s your mother.” This time the voice was close. Soft. Reassuring. Mary stepped to the edge of the barn door, her body caught in a shaft of sunlight. “Can I come in?”

Plato looked over at her, then dipped his hand into the pocket of his suit, where he’d put the detonator. “Go away.”

“Don’t shut me out. I want to help you.”

“I don’t need your help. I just need to think. I need to be alone.”

“You spend too much time alone, dear.”

“It’s my life.”

“Of course it is. Nobody’s denying that.”

“Did you hear what I did to Bernice’s boyfriend? Maybe the police haven’t found him yet. I shot him last night.”

“I know,” said Mary, stepping a few paces closer. “But he’s doing fine.”

Plato looked up sharply. “I shot him a bunch of times in the chest.”

“He was wearing one of those vests, the kind that bullets don’t go through.”

“No shit?”

“Plato, your language. You don’t need to talk like that.”

Here they were, in a life-and-death situation, police with loaded rifles all around them, dynamite strapped to his chest, and his mother was scolding him for using profanity. Only in a small town.

“Why don’t you let the girl go, dear? I’ll stay here with you instead. It will work out just the same. The police can’t do anything if they think an innocent person might be harmed. Maybe, after the girl leaves, we could ask them to bring us some breakfast. Would you like that?”

Of course, thought Plato. He could ask for anything he wanted. “Maybe I’ll demand a limo to take us to the airport. And then a plane to South America. Throw in a million bucks and we’ve got ourselves a plan!”

“Be reasonable, dear. This is Rose Hill. The police are already falling over themselves trying to figure out what to do next. You can’t put any more pressure on them. It wouldn’t be kind, and you’re not that sort of man.”

“Mother, I killed Kirby Runbeck, and attempted to kill two other people.”

She seemed startled. “
You
killed Kirby?”

“What do you think this is all about?”

“I thought you were angry at your father, and that it escalated into—” She spread her arms wide. “This.”

“It did.”

“But murder?”

He groaned.

“Plato, I demand an explanation.”

“Look, the girl’s behind the hay bales. Go get her.”

“But—”

“No more talking. Take her and leave.”

“But, son, what are you going to do?”

“I don’t know!”

“Give yourself up. I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you. You and Bernice are the lights of my life. You’re still my little boy. I’d do anything for you.”

He felt himself begin to crumble. “Get the girl, Mom, before I change my mind and blow us all up.”

“You’d never hurt me.”

“Get her!”

Hesitantly, Mary crossed to the back of the barn. Crouching down, she untied the ropes, then helped the girl to her feet. “Plato, we can work this out somehow,” she said as she passed slowly by him.

“Wait,” said Plato gruffly. He stood and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “I love you, Mom. Don’t worry. I’ll be out in a little while.”

She smiled uncertainly. “I’ll be waiting.”

Once they were gone, Plato spent a few moments petting Astrid’s head. “You’re a good girl,” he said softly. “You’re my cow.”

He sat down to think. Every once in a while, his musings were interrupted by the annoying sound of Doug Elderberg shouting at him, but Plato didn’t listen anymore. What was the use? He’d made up his mind.

As the sun reached midday, the heat in the barn was beginning to rise to an unhealthy level. Astrid was growing restless. She needed to get outside where there was a breeze, where she could nibble on some grass.

Moving over to the door, Plato called, “Doug? Are you there?”

“I’m here,” came the prompt, booming response.

“I’ve got an unhappy cow in here. The barn’s awfully hot. She needs to get outside. Will you let me walk her out to the pasture?”

No response. He was probably conferring with his henchmen. Finally, “All right, Plato. But stay to the south of the barn.”

Slipping a rope around Astrid’s neck, Plato tugged her to the door. With his hand on the detonator, he looked around. The air was still, the silence oppressive. When he reached the edge of the pasture, he stopped for a moment. A shiny new penny lay at his feet. As he bent down to pick it up, he heard the report of a rifle. Lunging forward, he slapped Astrid on her haunch, sending her away from him, then spun around and dodged his way back to the barn.

“At least she’s safe now,” he whispered, hearing a hail of bullets hit the metal walls. It was almost over. In one deafening blast, his pain would end forever.

Or would it?

Plato’s father had always maintained that most solutions were only temporary. Since Plato believed in an afterlife, as his finger slipped over the detonator, he wondered if this solution fell into that category.

Epilogue

Sophie sat by the hospital room window, knitting a wool scarf. She hadn’t done any knitting in years, but she needed to keep busy right now, keep moving, even if only barely. She’d made herself a cup of tea a few minutes ago, a variety that promised to tame her tension, but it wasn’t working. In an effort to occupy herself with something other than worry, her thoughts turned to Cora Runbeck’s cat. Winthrop had been found locked in a small cage in the basement of the
Rose Hill Gazette
two days after Plato had blown himself up. Plato had given him water and food, but by the time he was discovered, it was all gone. His plight had made headlines as far away as New Zealand. A veterinarian had checked him over and pronounced him frightened but fit, and Cora had taken him home to the cheers of cat lovers everywhere.

A lot had happened since Plato’s death three months ago. It was late November now, a few days before Thanksgiving. The last Sophie had heard, Cora Runbeck was commuting to New York and L.A. on a regular basis. Her cat’s odyssey had ended happily, and so had her own.

After being wined and dined in the Twin Cities as the third-place winner of the
Times Register
’s meat loaf contest, Cora had made a hit on
Good Morning with
Bailey Brown
. So much of a hit that she’d been invited back three times. By the middle of October, she was a regular on the program. And by early November, she’d been a guest on
The Tonight Show
,
David Letterman,
Oprah,
and
Rosie
. The latest scuttlebutt hinted that Cora would be the first person to land a regular berth on
Politically Incorrect
with Bill Maher. In three short months, she’d become a Minnesota phenomena, spouting her no-nonsense, small-town, Lutheran-inspired brand of plain talk on all the major networks. People couldn’t seem to get enough of her.

Except for the Washburns. Sophie and Bram had driven down to Rose Hill in early October for Bernice and Angelo’s wedding. Since everyone else in the country was talking and laughing about Cora, the fact that her name was never once mentioned didn’t go unnoticed. And yet, nothing could get in the way of Bernice and Angelo’s happiness that day. To everyone’s delight, John was there, too, sitting in a wheelchair, thin as a reed in a new suit. He may not have been dancing at their wedding, but he was beaming with joy.

Later, when the happy couple was in Venice on their honeymoon, John had suffered a second stroke. He lived for two days before dying quietly in his sleep. Mary and Milton were at his side until the end. Mary called Bernice and Angelo when it was over, saying that John wanted to be cremated. His memorial service could wait until they returned from their trip.

Before Angelo left for Italy, he and Sophie had talked privately. He insisted that John’s secrets be kept from the family. He’d already extracted an oath of silence from Cora. If Bernice or her mother ever learned the truth, it would only cause more pain. Sophie went along with him because she had no reason not to.

Angelo and Bernice were living in Connecticut now. And Milton and Mary were happily settled at the house in Rose Hill. Bernice wrote Sophie that her mother had fallen in love with Milton, never guessing that Sophie already knew. Bernice was happy that her mother wouldn’t be alone, now that her father was gone. She approved wholeheartedly of the relationship, though she didn’t think Milton and her mother would ever marry. They’d been down that road and didn’t want to do it again. If they continued to live in the house without benefit of matrimony, it would become quite the scandal in Rose Hill. But Bernice said her mother had changed since her father’s death. She didn’t care these days what other people thought. What she thought was more important.

As for Viola Newman, the old woman in the nursing home, Sophie drove down to visit her every few weeks. Viola said she missed Jim, as she still called John Washburn, but she was glad he’d finally found peace. She talked to him every day now and felt he was listening, that he was waiting for her to join him. Sophie hoped that was true.

After taking a sip of tea, Sophie’s thoughts turned to Nathan Buckridge. His dining room at Chez Sophia was finally under construction and he was busily at work with a commercial kitchen designer. She’d driven out one afternoon in late October to see the plans. Nathan was bouncing off walls he was so excited. She was happy for him. He wanted her to come back the following day to look at carpet samples, but she said she couldn’t. He didn’t press her and she was glad. Nathan had been a huge question mark tossed in the path of an otherwise happy marriage. But a few days ago, a new, more ominous threat had turned up. At this moment, all Sophie wanted was to spend the rest of her life with her husband. She wanted a
long
life with him, but that was up in the air right now.

Three days ago, while Bram had been doing his afternoon radio program, he’d begun to experience chest pains. As soon as the paramedics had been summoned, there’d been a mad scramble at the station to find someone to fill in for him. Sophie had been called and had met him at the emergency room entrance. The paramedics had already started him on oxygen and an IV in the ambulance. She’s been so glad he was awake and able to talk that she’d burst into tears—not particularly helpful. Once he was stabilized, an emergency room doctor had come in to ask him some questions. Had he ever experienced chest pain before? Did he take any medications? Had a member of his family ever had a heart attack? Sophie was stunned to learn that Bram’s father had suffered a heart attack in his early fifties, and that his uncle, his father’s brother, had died of a heart attack when he was fifty-two. Bram had turned fifty-two in September. No wonder he didn’t want to celebrate his birthday this year. If only Sophie had known. It explained so much about his recent actions. That’s why he’d been trying so hard to get into shape. The physical he’d been given back in August hadn’t suggested anything was wrong, but based on his family history, he must have had a premonition.

Bram was still sweating and in pain when they finally wheeled him off to do an EKG. Sophie spent the next hour in the waiting room, pacing in front of the window. She couldn’t believe this was actually happening. Finally, a different doctor, a man named Stoebel, came out to talk to her. He explained that they’d found blockages in two of her husband’s major arteries and were prepping him for bypass surgery. Bram would be given a general anesthetic and wouldn’t be awake during the procedure. The surgery would take anywhere from two to six hours. A bypass graft would be performed to reroute blood flow around the blockages. Dr. Stoebel felt that Bram would do just fine, but he wasn’t offering certainties.

There had been no time for a second opinion. No time to check out Dr. Stoebel’s medical references. Sophie had called her son, and he and his partner, John, had arrived just as the surgery began. Together, they waited.

That was three days ago. Bram had come through the surgery like a trooper. For the first twenty-four hours, his condition had been monitored closely in the cardiac intensive care unit. Because of a breathing tube, Bram couldn’t talk, but his eyes spoke eloquently. He was scared, but incredibly happy to be alive. Yesterday, the tube was removed and he’d been allowed to sit up in bed. When he coughed, he used a pillow to cover the incision and lessen the pain.

And today, the third day after the operation, his nurse had helped him to get up. He moved slowly around the room for a few minutes, then sat in the chair and watched a little TV. He was so tired when he got back into bed that he’d been asleep ever since.

Hearing Bram stir, Sophie set her knitting down and went to make sure he was okay.

“Hi, sweetheart,” he said, seeing her face loom over him.

With her diminutive height, Sophie rarely had the chance to loom over anyone, so this was a rare occasion.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Like I got hit by a truck.” His voice was still raspy and sore from the breathing tube. “But happy to be here.”

She touched his face tenderly. “Dr. Stoebel was in a while ago. He says you’re doing better than expected.”

“That’s me. An overachiever to the bitter end.”

“This isn’t the end, sweetheart. You’re doing so well. You’ll be home soon.”

“We’ll see.” He coughed, then winced.

She took hold of his hand. “Bram? Why didn’t you tell me about your father’s heart attack? I thought he died of lung cancer.”

“He did.”

“Then—”

“The heart attack didn’t kill him. My uncle wasn’t so lucky. It seems the Baldric men have a fatal flaw. Not only do their hearts break easily, but they don’t work very well.”

“You mean you’ve been carrying this worry around with you all these years? I wish you’d told me.”

“Why? So you could worry, too?”

“Yes,” she said, squeezing his hand. “We’re a team.”

He searched her eyes for a long moment.

Finally, Sophie said, “You’ll recover from this, honey. You’re going to be better than ever.”

His expression softened. “Frisky and feisty?”

She nodded.

“From your mouth to God’s ears.”

“That’s right,” she said, straightening his bed covers. “After all the time I put in with the Church of the Firstborn, I should get
some
points.” She was about to adjust the pillow behind his head when he took hold of her sweater.

“I love you,” he said, a heartbreaking urgency in his voice.

“And I love you.”

“A team, right?”

She smiled to cover her tears. “Forever, sweetheart. You and me against the world.”