Jack and the Beanstalk (Matthew Hope) (16 page)

“All confirmed, huh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You think he might be covering for her?”

“That’s possible. But there’s a kid at McDonald’s who knows them both, and he said he served them hamburgers at a little after seven.”

“Still, there’s nobody but the two of them to confirm she was with Crowell all night, is that right?”

“That’s right.”

“Stay on that, Bloom, I want to know more about it.”

“Yes, sir, we
are
on it. We’re canvassing Crowell’s neighborhood, trying to find anybody who might have seen him and the girl going in or coming out.”

“What the hell’s taking you so long?”

“Big neighborhood, captain. He lives in a housing project in New Town.”

“He’s a
nigger
?” the captain said. “She was fucking a
nigger
?”

“He’s white,” Bloom said. “There are whites in the project, too. It’s a low-income project.”

“I thought it was only niggers in New Town,” the captain said, and shook his head.

“No, sir.”

“And you say McKinney was killed at nine o’clock?”

“That’s the coroner’s estimate, sir.”

“Well, stay with it.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Captain Hopper?” someone said.

So much for total recall.

The captain walked over to where someone was standing near the telephone I’d used earlier. He handed something to the captain. Hopper looked at it.

“Some dump here,” Bloom said, looking around. “McKinney was paying forty K for it, huh?”

“There’s fifteen acres of land,” I said.

“Must be
some
land,” Bloom said. “Must be
oil
on it.”

“Take a look at this,” Hopper said, handing me a slip of paper. My name and phone number were handwritten on it. “This you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You talk to Burrill recently?”

“He called me the day after McKinney was murdered,” I said.

“What’d he want?”

“He’d heard about the murder, and he wanted to know what would happen next.”

“How’d he seem to you?”

“Eager to close the deal.”

“You talk to him since?”

“Just his attorney.”

“How’d you get here?” Hopper asked suddenly.

“I walked,” I said.

“All the way from Calusa?”

“My car’s up the road. The battery went dead.”

“Convenient,” Hopper said, and walked over to look at the chalked outline on the floor.

“Schmuck,” Bloom whispered under his breath. Aloud, he said, “Okay if Mr. Hope goes now?”

“Who’s Mr. Hope?” Hopper asked, without turning to look at us.

“I am,” I said.

“Sure, go ahead,” he said.

Bloom shook his head, and then walked me outside.

“You want a lift back to town?” he asked. “I’ll be here awhile yet, but as soon as His Royal Schmuck is gone, I’ll get one of the blues to drive you back.”

“I’d appreciate it,” I said.

I did not get back to the office until a quarter past six. I called the service station I usually dealt with, told them what had happened and where the car was, and asked if someone could stop by to pick up the keys. They promised that someone would be there within the next half hour. There were several pink message slips on my desk, but it was too late to return any calls.

There was also a handwritten note from Frank. It read:

The tow truck arrived some ten minutes later. I gave the mechanic the keys and asked him when he thought I could have the car back. He shrugged. Mechanics, I’ve discovered, shrug almost as often as doctors do. It must have been about seven-fifteen when I left the office. I was just locking the door when the telephone rang. I debated going in again to answer it, and decided against it. I had dinner alone at an Italian restaurant within walking distance of the office—there is not a single good Italian restaurant in all Calusa; most of them are owned and operated by Greeks from Tarpon Springs—and then took a taxi home. It was almost nine o’clock when I got to the house.

A red Porsche was parked in my driveway.

I paid and tipped the cabbie, walked around to the kitchen door, unlocked it, stepped into the house, and immediately heard the sound of someone splashing around in my pool. This time I did not turn on any lights. I went directly to the sliding glass doors, unlocked them, pulled them open, and stepped out onto the terrace.

I had a distinct feeling of déjà vu.

Sunny McKinney was in my pool again.

Sunny McKinney was swimming underwater.

Sunny McKinney was naked.

Her body, tanned and long and supple, moved effortlessly and gracefully beneath the moonstruck surface, a triangle of white flesh showing where the sun had not touched her, arms pushing water in a strong breast stroke, legs frog-kicking behind her, blonde hair reflecting glints of whatever pale light there was. Underwater, she touched the tiles at the far end of the pool, executed a swift turn, still submerged, and started back for the shallow end. Midway between the far end of the pool and where I was standing, she came up for air. I caught only a glimpse of her blonde hair before she went under again, but it was enough to tell me that the lady in my pool wasn’t who I’d thought she was.

Still unaware of my presence, she surfaced near the pool steps, touched the bottom step for support, stood up, and began climbing the steps. She was not, as I had earlier surmised, entirely naked. What I’d taken for an untanned triangle of flesh was in reality a pair of white bikini panties, soaked through now and showing a darker triangular patch above the joining of her legs. Her hair was cut in a short wedge, but her body could have been Sunny’s exactly, long and tan and supple and firm. Veronica McKinney still didn’t know I was standing there. The moment, for her at least, was a private one. She shook out her short hair. She put a finger in her left ear, jumped up and down on her left foot, did the same to her right ear and on her right foot, ran her hands over her breasts to stroke water from them, and did the same with her belly and thighs. She went to the lounge chair where her clothes were neatly folded, reached into her bag for a tissue, and blew her nose.

“Hi,” I said.

She turned, startled.

“Hi,” she said. “You’re home, huh?”

“I’m home.”

We looked at each other. She smiled.

“Caught me trespassing, huh?” she said. “Will you prosecute?”

“I don’t think so.”

We kept looking at each other.

“You want a towel, right?” I said.

“Wrong,” she said.

She rummaged around in her handbag again, found a package of cigarettes, shook one free, and lit it. “Mm, good,” she said, exhaling, and sat on the edge of the lounge next to the one with her clothes folded on it. There was a faint chill on the air; her nipples were puckering.

“I tried you at the office,” she said, “but I got no answer.”

“When was this?”

“Seven, seven-thirty? I was at a very dull cocktail party in that new condo on the Gulf—what’s it called?”

“Bayview?”

“Bayview, yes. Stuffy and boring. I also called you here. No answer. I figured you had to come home sooner or later, so I drove on over. Your address is in the phone book, you know.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Well,” she said, “aren’t you going to offer me a drink?”

The feeling of déjà vu persisted.

“Sure,” I said. “What would you like?”

“Sour mash on the rocks, if you’ve got any.”

“I think so,” I said, and paused before going back into the house. “Would you like a robe or something?” I asked.

“No, thanks, I’m fine,” she said.

I went to the bar and poured a generous splash of bourbon into a short glass. I mixed myself a Dewar’s and soda. I picked
up an ashtray and carried that out to the terrace as well, a drink in each hand, the ashtray pressed against my ribs with my right elbow.

“Oh, good,” she said, “I was
wondering
what to do with this.”

She stubbed out the cigarette and accepted the drink. “Thanks,” she said. “Your pool was delightful, I hope you don’t mind my using it. It got so hot.”

I was wondering why she was here. Had she heard about Burrill’s murder on the six o’clock news? It didn’t seem likely that someone had turned on a television set at a cocktail party.

“Cheers,” she said.

“Cheers,” I said.

We drank.

“Why don’t
you
take a swim?” she said.

“Maybe later,” I said.

“At least take off your jacket and tie,” she said. “Aren’t you suffocating?”

I took off my jacket and draped it over the back of the lounge chair behind her clothes. She’d been wearing white tonight. A silky-looking white dress neatly folded on the seat of the chair, a pair of high-heeled white patent slippers side by side on the tiles. No bra, I noticed. And she was
wearing
the panties that completed the outfit. I yanked down the knot of my tie, and unfastened the top button of my shirt.

“There,” she said, “isn’t that better?”

“Much,” I said.

“Always listen to Mama,” she said. “Does it embarrass you, my sitting here like this?”

“No,” I said.

“You keep averting your eyes,” she said. “You needn’t.”

I felt as if I’d been reincarnated by mistake into the same life I’d already lived last Friday night. Remembering Sunny,
I suddenly wondered how far from the tree the acorn ever really fell, and I wondered again why Veronica had come here. Perhaps I was avoiding the obvious. I was certainly old enough and experienced enough to accept without question a partially clad woman sipping a poolside bourbon and telling me I didn’t have to worry about where my eyes wandered. But I had never flattered myself into believing I was irresistible to women; I had, in fact, spent the better part of my life convincing myself that I could be even slightly attractive to any member of the opposite sex, despite the knowledge that many of the women I’d known in my adult life were, at the very least, pretty. Perhaps unfulfilled teenage yearnings died hard. I know only that I felt as if I were back in Chicago again, scrawny and acne-ridden and steaming with adolescent passion. Here and now was Calusa, Florida, on a sweltering night in August. Here and now was Veronica McKinney sitting casually, albeit half naked, in the moonlight while I sat fully clothed, looking at all the beautiful foliage,
and
the sky,
and
the moon,
and
the pool, and anything but her. Maybe it had something to do with her age. Maybe, by comparison, I
was
a teenager.

“Cat got your tongue?” she asked.

“Just thinking,” I said.

“About what?”

“About why you came here.”

“I was bored. Also, I remembered you had a pool.”

“Okay,” I said.

“I don’t know why I’m making you so nervous,” she said. “But I’ll dress if you like.”

She looked at me questioningly. I said nothing. She rose suddenly.

“Turn your back,” she said.

I did not turn my back.

“Naughty boy,” she said, and rolled the wet panties down over her thighs and ankles and stepped out of them. She picked up the white dress, pulled it over her head, and smoothed it over her hips and thighs. “There,” she said, “is that better? Don’t look so stern and disapproving, Matthew.”

“Is that how I look?”

“Indeed.”

“Actually, I’m glad you’re here.”

“You seem positively overjoyed.”

“I planned to call you in the morning, anyway.”

“Ah? What about?”

“I went to see Loomis again this afternoon.”

She raised her eyebrows expectantly. I did not know how much I should actually tell her. She seemed not to know that Burrill had been murdered, and I didn’t think I should be the one to inform her. At the same time, Loomis had made his counteroffer on behalf of a client who was now
dead
. Would Burrill’s heirs, if there were any, insist on the same terms for settlement? I decided to tread very cautiously.

“He made a counteroffer,” I said. “He wants you to pay five thousand dollars in damages.”

“
What
damages?”

“He claims his client lost potential buyers.”

“Yes, I’m sure the woods are just
full
of aspiring snapbean farmers. I hope you told him to go to hell.”