I whistled with mock admiration. "Oh, now I get it. And he just happens to be the same guy who wants to kick your ass over a girl. Hey, with that kind of impartial evidence you can't miss."
"Then who did it, and why?"
"Beats me," I sighed. "Oh come on, Jerry. How the hell should I know?" I didn't want to care, but now the anger was coming back; low and urgent like a sexual heat. "Listen, proving who did it won't be easy."
"I want to try."
"I'd like to help, but if I don't leave right now, I may not get that job in L.A."
"So fuck it."
I stared at him evenly. "This wouldn't be Jerry thinking he finally has his big chance to be a celebrity, would it?"
Jerry shook his head. "Whoa. That was a cheap shot."
"Level with me, here. There's no better reason for wanting to stick your neck out like this? Come on, kid. I want to hear you say it."
Jerry studied his tennis shoes. He blushed and his scar darkened. "Skanky."
"The girl. The one I saw you with this morning."
Jerry, urgently: "Look, if I'm right and Bobby Sewell killed Sandy Palmer then Skanky is in a world of hurt. I don't want to leave her behind. Hell, I didn't really want to leave town in the first place, man. I need to see her again." He looked up with wet eyes. "Mick, you got to help me out here. Please."
"Okay. Let me think for a minute." I lowered my head, massaged my temples.
This is stupid, really stupid. Bass is going to lose it if you stick around
. But when I examined my motives for refusing to help, I did not like them either. A few moments passed.
"Can I ask you something, Mick?"
"Sure."
"What the hell happened to you?"
It took me a long time to answer him. "Life happened."
Maybe I could help him out. Maybe there was still time to make something good from a whole lot of bad mistakes. But the wild card was that dead man in the alley. How did his murder factor into this, if at all? My head was spinning.
"So you won't help me. Wow, I looked up to you, dude." Fussing with the baseball cap again, wriggling the eyebrows. "You were my hero."
"Jerry?"
The kid unlocked the car door and got out. "I'm going to find out what happened on my own, then. If I can prove Bobby Sewell killed Sandy, I'll be able to help Skanky and all my problems will go to jail along with his hillbilly ass."
"You're crazy, you know that."
"I'll handle it." He began to walk away, but then froze when he heard me start the engine.
"Jerry? Wait." He turned with a widening grin. I sighed and patted the seat. "Get in. Let's go somewhere and talk."
Six
Saturday Afternoon, 1: 15 PM
Madge Wynn's parents opened the tiny diner before the Second World War, when Dry Wells was still thriving. They called it Margie's, after Madge Wynn's mother, now long deceased. Madge herself was in her late sixties. Her customers were drive-through tourists or aging friends who skipped meals at home to keep Margie's in business. Strong coffee, eggs, home fries, and gigantic pancakes were her specialty. The food was plain, but always good.
Old Madge was back in the kitchen, her silver hair bobbing above the stove beyond the pass-through. Three empty cardboard boxes cluttered the hallway. A dry mop sat near a tipped-over, empty bucket. The lone waitress was a slender, pretty lady a few years shy of forty. She was the same woman who had studied me through the front window earlier. She had short brown hair, wide eyes, and the tanned face of someone accustomed to high desert sunshine. She tried to catch my eye as we ordered, but I was too preoccupied to notice.
Jerry and I sat in a corner booth. The cheap wall clock flagged the passing seconds like a woodpecker. We ate our sandwiches in relative silence. Jerry ordered a bottle of beer. I drank cola.
"This is so sad. I can't stop thinking about it."
"Me neither." My anger was muted, more manageable, the rage channeled.
"She was special, Mick."
"They all are."
"Huh?"
"Jerry, I want you to do me a favor. Let's change the topic. I want to talk about something else."
"Talk about what?" Jerry was puzzled.
"In one of your E-mails, a few weeks ago, you told me about being a kid on the streets back in Arizona. It was funny stuff, and I found it interesting."
"Mick," Jerry sighed, "what the fuck?"
"I want to change the subject, clear our heads. It's a technique. You're from somewhere in Arizona, right? You ended up in a foster home?"
"Yeah, a few of them. The last was a piss-ant burg called Rock Ridge," Jerry said. "It really sucked."
"Go on." It was getting hot. I wiped my face with a forearm.
Jerry slowly warmed to the subject. "Dude, it's ugly. People who need a few extra bucks sign up, take some dumb shit course, and figure they've got themselves a house slave."
"What happened to your real parents?"
"I don't know. I become successful, famous for something, then maybe they'll find
me
. . . if they're still alive." Jerry spilled some salt on the table and moved it around with his fingertips. "Or I guess I could go looking for them online."
"You found me fast enough," I said.
Jerry laughed. "I used to run away all the time, dude. The very last time, I got away from this old drunken fart named Boone and his fat wife. I hot-wired two of his cars, sold them off, and bought myself the scooter. I was sixteen years old, and I left and never looked back."
"Revenge is sweet."
"So is hot wiring cars, but I cut it out. Hey, pirating electronics is a step up for somebody like me."
I stared out the window for a moment, then back. "Jerry, what happened to your face? Do you mind talking about it?"
An enormous chasm opened and filled itself with a thick, syrupy silence. Jerry's left hand began to rise as if to touch the scar tissue, but he stopped himself. Eventually he answered me with the scratchy, broken voice of a little boy.
"Mrs. Boone was ironing," he said. "I was doing the dishes. I accidentally broke a glass. When I turned around to say I was sorry, she grabbed my hair. Then she held the hot iron against my face."
"Jesus Christ."
"Jesus was nowhere to be found, my man."
"How old are you now, Jerry, twenty-five?"
"Twenty-three." He looked up as if something had just occurred to him. "You know what, Mick? You ask a lot of questions, but you don't answer many."
I squirmed. "Force of habit."
"Is that why you became a shrink?"
"My stepfather used to make me fight other kids for money, Jerry."
"Whoa. Damn."
"My real father was a drunk. I guess I wanted to understand people like that, and why my mother married those men. I wanted to understand myself, because I kept drinking even though I knew better. I washed out of the Seals with a bad attitude, but then became a straight A student and licensed shrink. The shrink got radio and television work that made him rich and famous, then he lost it all. Same old story."
The pretty waitress was cleaning up. Her pink blouse and the knees of her torn jeans were damp. She started wiping down the table next booth. She caught my eye and winked. Something tickled my memory. I smiled back at her, puzzled. Her smile grew wider. She said: "You boys need anything else?"
"Not now, thanks." I still couldn't place her. The woman frowned and wandered away. "Now Jerry, look at me. Why would someone murder Sandy Palmer?"
Jerry was caught off-guard. "Jesus, dude. She called you saying she had a serious problem with her boyfriend. That he was into something and she was scared. Now she's dead. Doesn't all that strike you as a little too coincidental?"
"Of course. But we're not cops, and we don't have anything to go on, or real evidence suggesting who would have wanted her dead."
"No? Let me enlighten you," Jerry said. "Take that big bastard of an ex-boyfriend Bobby Sewell. He's got to be the meanest redneck in four counties. Sandy dumped him a couple of weeks ago, and Sewell ain't used to losing. I say it was him, or maybe one of his asshole buddies did it so he'd have an alibi."
"Maybe."
"Mick, work with me. I liked Sandy, but never had the balls to ask her out. I hardly ever do stuff like that. I just got lucky with that girl Skanky last night. Look, nothing like that ever happens to me.
Nada
. You know that sign some people stick on their cars that says 'Just Married'? Well, mine is gonna say 'Just Friends.'"
I laughed out loud, but Jerry looked dead serious. His eyes turned wet and shiny. "I really
like
this girl, Mick. Can you understand that?"
"Sure," I said. "I understand."
The moment vanished. "Anyway, back to Sandy Palmer. She was always cool. It made her stand out. I'd crack a joke and she would giggle. I might say good morning, she'd say it back. Pretty girls aren't usually that nice to geeks, especially with a face that's . . . anyway, Sandy was different."
"Okay. Who else besides Bobby do we consider a suspect?"
"Well then, there are the Palmers themselves," Jerry said, "or their enemies. The old man is really hated. Rumor has it he's terminally ill, but some say he fakes being in a wheelchair so folks will be nice to him."
"What about the brother?"
"Will? He's loco."
I leaned forward on the table. Silverware clinked. Flies buzzed on the window. "Okay, let me feed this back. Her ex-boyfriend doesn't like you, so he's a suspect. So are all of his strange friends. Will Palmer and his father are garden-variety rich pricks so we add them, and likewise anyone who works for or with them. Also enemies of the family, which means half the county, and don't forget any strangers passing through, and every horny male that was unaccounted for. Have I left anything out?"
"Well damn, if you put it
that
way."
"If I put it that way, damned near everyone in or around Dry Wells could have killed Sandy. Jerry, let's take off for Elko. I can still catch a late plane."
The waitress approached our booth. She was drying her hands and rubbing her clothes with a towel. "Sorry, I lost control of a hose there for a minute." She tried a little more eye contact. She was very pretty, so I smiled back. She let me know she liked it. "You boys done here?"
"I guess so," I said. "What's the damage?"
She handed me the check, still trying to hold my gaze. She chuckled uneasily, a bit surprised and perhaps hurt. "You really don't remember me, do you?"
"I'm sorry," I said. "I know I should." Then my jaw dropped. "Son of a bitch! You're Annie?"
She nodded and blushed, her jaw tight, as if she were upset that it had taken me so long.
"Of course I remember you, sweetheart," I said. And some of what I was remembering embarrassed me. "No glasses?"
"I wear contacts. My hair is a different color now, too. And it's shorter."
"Hot damn, Annie." I stuck out my hand, and she shook it.
"Hot damn is right," she said. She surprised me with a bear hug.
Flustered, I turned to Jerry. "Have you met? This is Madge Wynn's niece."
Jerry snorted. "Met? Hell, I only eat the food here every damned day so I can look at her." Then he shrank back as if he had revealed too much.
To her credit, Annie just smiled. She kissed him on the cheek, right next to the lower end of his burn scar. "Why, Jerry, what a sweet thing to say!"
Jerry swallowed. "S-So you two know each other too, huh?"
Annie slid closer to me. "Mick here was a couple of years behind me in middle school. We knew each other real well."
My mind visited a lot of old places and hot memories. I smiled, determined to keep things light. "I seem to recall you had a pet turtle when we were in elementary."
"That I did, Callahan. And you gave me a pretty miserable time about it, as I recollect. From there on, and all the way through." She smiled brightly again, but bitterness crouched between the lines. Jerry wriggled his eyebrows at me.
"I hurt you some. Especially by up and leaving for the Seals like that," I said, softly. "I'm sorry."
She shrugged, but it was clear the apology meant something. Annie let the tips of her fingers brush my arm. She moved a few inches closer. Startled, I stepped back and cleared my throat. "You haven't been living here the whole time, have you Annie?"
She shook her head. "I moved to Ely for a while. Right after I lost a baby."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
Tone chipper, smile forced: "It was a while ago. Then I tried Reno. I had a couple of marriages bust up, still no kids. Now Mom's getting on in years and needs help . . . so, here I am. Hey, I caught your show on the radio."
"I'm afraid it wasn't very good."
"I don't know about that. Probably better than you think," Annie said. She licked her lips. "You remember me now, right?" She meant sexually, not socially.
"Oh, I surely do, ma'am."
Annie gathered confidence from my discomfort. She looked me over as if I was up for auction, taunted me. "You're all grown up and filled out, boy. Television don't do you justice."
Jerry looked envious. I blushed. "You look great too, Annie."
Satisfied she'd made her point, Annie turned and walked away. She seemed to put a little extra energy into swinging her hips.
"Lord God," Jerry whispered. "I just
got
to be famous someday. You gonna tell me about her? I'm all ears."
"You're all hormones," I said. I dropped the check on the table and searched my pockets for money. "Let's stick to the point. Look, Jerry, I promised myself I'd get another job right away. I vote we hit the road for Elko, and I mean ten minutes ago, and send the girl a bus ticket. You with me?"