Till the Butchers Cut Him Down (7 page)

The roses—a single long-stemmed beauty delivered every Tuesday—were Hy’s way of keeping us close no matter how long the separation
or how great the distance between us. Initially they’d been yellow; after we became lovers he changed their color to an exotic
tangerine; but after that harrowing time last June when I’d almost lost him, he changed it once again—to a velvety blackish
red. We’d talked about his reasons for the other color choices: yellow because I wasn’t traditional enough for red or sentimental
enough for pink; exotic tangerine because it described our passion. But this strange deep red? Neither of us had so much as
mentioned it.

I went over and touched the flower’s soft petals, breathed in its rich fragrance. Red—the color of love, the deeper the better.
Red—the color of shed blood, the product of violence. Which? Both had been components of that tumultuous week. …

My fingers tightened on the stem of the vase. Suddenly I wanted to pick it up and hurl it at the wall. Better yet, seize the
rose, rip its petals off, and trample them.

After all we’d gone through during that week, after all we’d almost lost, after all the commitment I thought we’d made to
each other, Hy was once more out of reach. Had, since he dropped me at Oakland Airport in early July, been off on an uncharacteristic
spate of traveling whose significance I failed to understand.

Postcards arrived and phone calls came. The plain white cards—Hy wasn’t the picture-postcard type—bore both U.S. and foreign
postmarks and messages of no consequence. The calls were brief, filled with superficial chatter: Yes, my business license
had come through. No, I hadn’t taken on any clients yet. Yes, the weather was hot and muggy in Miami—or rainy in London or
overcast in New York. No, he wasn’t exactly sure where he’d be going next. I’d filed the cards in order, listed the dates
and cities of origin of the calls. Neither gave a hint of an organized itinerary; neither revealed the purpose of his travels.

For some time now Hy had expressed dissatisfaction with his participation in the environmental movement; he felt his confrontational
style was outmoded, his fund-raising ability limited. In June he also had been forced to face his past and reassess his future.
Like me, he’d opted for change, but so far I hadn’t a clue as to what form that change would take. All I knew was that his
travels were not the typical idle wanderings of a man with a good deal of money and time on his hands.

I also suspected that somehow his movements were connected to a mysterious nine-year hole in his life—a period that had almost
destroyed him and about which he’d told no one, not even me.

I didn’t know what hurt more—his refusal to open up to me or his absence right now when I needed him most. I’d set out on
the riskiest venture of my life: for the first time I was working alone without the support of an employer; money was flying
out the door, but clients weren’t flying in; my sister had saddled me with a teenager with criminal tendencies. And now I’d
been presented a first case that was potentially lucrative but riddled with complications. I needed to talk with Hy, my touchstone,
but I hadn’t the faintest idea of where in the world to reach him.

I eyed the rose malevolently. Plucked it from the vase and fingered a petal, contemplating a perverse variant on the old he-loves-me-he-loves-me-not
game, involving atrocities I’d have liked to commit upon my lover. Then I replaced it, straightening its greenery. No sense
in trivializing the situation; no need to add childishness to my roster of character defects.

Forcing my attention back to Suitcase Gordon, I decided to go upstairs and see if Rae was home. In the past I’d often benefited
from her insights; maybe she could cut to the core of my uncertainty about taking him on as my first client.

Rae lived in a big skylit room in the attic. She, Ted, tax attorney Pam Ogata, and corporate-law specialist Larry Koslowski
were the last holdouts from the days when All Souls was a poverty law firm in the strictest sense of the term and offered
its underpaid staff free rooms as part of their meager compensation package. The four stayed because they enjoyed the camaraderie,
and more often than not many of us who lived elsewhere could be found there after the close of business, sitting in on their
poker games or pitching in at their potlucks.

I knocked on the frame of Rae’s Moroccan-curtained doorway, and her voice called for me to come in. I swept the curtain aside,
ducked my head to avoid a low beam, and entered. The room was dimly lighted; Rae sat cross-legged on the floor under the roof’s
steep angle, wearing her ratty plaid bathrobe and peering at her face in an illuminated makeup mirror perched atop the trunk
where she kept her jeans and sweaters. She saw me in the mirror and grinned, her freckled nose crinkling. “Hey, I was just
thinking about you,” she said.

“Really?” I sat down on the mattress and box spring that were all that remained of her treasured brass bed. It had gotten
crushed while the skylights were being installed last spring and, true to form, Rae had spent the insurance money on a trip
to Tahoe and some clothes. I saw that one of the new outfits, a clingy skirt and tunic in a russet color that complemented
her auburn hair, was laid out on the mattress. “Date tonight?” I asked.

“Not exactly. But I’m running late, and that’s one reason I was thinking about you. You really ought to curb your nephew.”

“What’s Mick done now?”

“Cornered me in my office when I was trying to finish up and asked me a bunch of questions about the business, some of which
I couldn’t answer.”

“Sorry about that. He’s going home at the end of the month.”

“Oh, I didn’t really mind.” She leaned closer to the mirror and began applying eye shadow. “I just hate having some kid know
more about my job than I do.”

“So what’s happening?” I motioned at the clothing.

Rae groaned, set the eye shadow down, and turned to face me. With only one eye done and a somewhat tremulous expression, she
looked like a little girl who’d gotten caught playing with her mother’s makeup. “Shar,” she said, “I’m going out with some
women friends tonight. To a bar.”

“The Remedy?” It was All Souls’s tavern of choice, down the hill on Mission Street.

“God, no. Would I get made up to go there? This is a nice bar—a club, actually—in the Marina. We’re going to … look for men.”

I waited.

“Did you hear what I said—look for men?”

“What’s wrong with that?”

She sighed. “Nothing, I guess. It’s just that I feel so … inexperienced. I haven’t really done that since college.”

“This must mean it’s finally over with Willie.” Since she divorced her perpetual-student husband, Rae had been seeing Willie
Whelan, self-styled discount-jewelry king of northern California—to say nothing of former fence of stolen goods. The relationship
had fallen apart over some nonsense about a prenuptial agreement last spring, but since then the two had argued on an almost
daily basis, and I’d expected they’d eventually get back together.

“It’s over,” she said, her mouth hardening. “And now I’m getting on with my life. But, God, it’s rough. Can’t you give me
some advice? I mean, you’ve never had any trouble getting men.”

I hadn’t, maybe because I’d always met my lovers when I was too wrapped up in something—a case, a cause, a class—to be anxious
about my lack of male companionship. In my experience, most worthwhile people are put off by someone who is obviously seeking
nothing more than a warm body. But I wasn’t about to tell Rae that when she was feeling so fragile, so I said lightly, “Consider
the quality of the men I’ve gotten.”

“Hy’s terrific, Shar. And you guys have a great relationship—so unconfining.”

“Mmm.” I thought of the rose petals that had almost littered my office floor. “Well, Hy excepted, I haven’t done all that
well.”

Rae was silent; I could tell she was checking names off a mental list. Then she shrugged and turned back to the mirror. “Well,
I just know that if I meet anybody tonight, he’ll be horrible. But I’m ready; I’ve memorized my friend Vanessa’s instructions.”

“Instructions?” In spite of wanting to talk about Suits, I was curious as to what kind of rules were mandated for present-day
barhopping.

“Instructions.” Rae nodded. “Don’t wear anything too revealing, but try to look subtly seductive. One glass of wine beforehand
for courage, but only one, and you travel by cab. Avoid the guys who’re scamming at the end of the bar by the door; they’re
usually nerds or predators, or both. Never go anyplace with a guy the first night; instead, exchange business cards and make
arrangements to meet the next week in a public place. But always carry condoms, just in case.” She snorted. “The damned things’ll
probably stay in my purse so long they’ll be fossilized. To tell you the truth, I’d much rather hang out and play pinball
at the Remedy.”

“So why don’t you?”

“No, I’ve got to at least give this a try. Tonight we hit this low-key place in the Marina where a lot of stockbrokers hang
out. If nothing pans out there, we’ll try a SoMa supper club and this neo-yuppie bar in South Beach next week. And if those
don’t produce, there’s a Eurocrowd café in North Beach that we’re saving for the week after that. And the week after
that,
you’ll find me in front of the Remedy’s pinball machine.”

I hesitated, trying to come up with an appropriate response. Actually I felt superior and envious at the same time. For as
long as I’d known her, Rae had drifted from one emotional catastrophe to another; this man-hunting scheme was sure to steer
her into trouble again. But at least she was sailing forth, out there with her face to the wind. Rae would never dream of
hanging around her office after business hours, contemplating mayhem on an innocent rose sent by a straying lover.

She noticed my silence and frowned. “Did you come up here for a reason, or just to chat?”

“A reason. Somebody who could become my first client showed up today.”

Rae ran her fingers through her unruly curls and stood up. “Good money?”

“He said to name my fee.”

“Go for it.”

“I’m not sure I should.” As she took the russet outfit from its hanger I began filling her in on Suits and his problem. My
voice rose as I talked; I could hear myself becoming unnecessarily strident.

“Dammit!” I concluded. “Why does this have to happen now? I don’t
want
my first client to be a weird guy out of my past who has serious potential to drive me crazy!”

“Sounds like he already has,” she said mildly, adjusting a scarf around her neck.

“Close to,” I admitted. “So what’s your take on it?”

“Well, if I read you right, you’ve got several objections to taking his case. One, you think the whole thing may be some paranoid
tic of his.”

I nodded.

“Two, you’re really still in the start-up phase with the agency, and you don’t have time for a complex investigation.”

“Right.”

“Three, this Suits used to be your lover.”

“A one-night stand ages ago doesn’t really qualify—”

“But he admitted he had a thing for you. That qualifies. And four—you said it—he’s weird.”

I waited, aware of Rae’s habit of building a case for one side, then arguing for the other.

She studied the hang of the scarf, made a face, and untied it. “Let’s address the issues in reverse order. He’s weird. Not
a valid objection—you
like
weird people. Face it, Shar—you’re a little off center yourself.”

“Moi?”

“Tu.
Okay, next objection—he was your lover, or whatever. Also not valid. You all but forgot about him years ago. And if he’s
harboring any feelings, it doesn’t sound as if he’s going to let them get in the way.” She adjusted the scarf one more time,
then yanked it off and tossed it on the mattress. “Third objection, you don’t have time. Bullshit. Anybody can make time to
charge a huge fee for doing something interesting. If you ask me, you’re afraid to take this on.”

“Afraid? That’s ridiculous!”

“Is it? Shar, all this interest in learning the computer, all this haste to get it down pat so you can send Mick home before
he gets any more obsessed with becoming an investigator—that’s just an excuse.”

“For?”

“For not plunging in and getting on with what you set out to do when you quit the co-op.”

The words stung. For a moment I wanted to lash out at her, but I couldn’t come up with a suitable retort. And, much as I hated
to admit it, she had a point.

“Fourth objection,” Rae went on, “Suits may be going ’round the bend. Well, maybe he is, but you’ll never really know unless
you take his case. Can you stand not knowing?”

Again she had me.

“Besides,” she added, “if somebody actually is trying to kill him, you can prevent it and become a little chapter in San Francisco
history.”

I snorted.

“Stranger things have happened.” She picked up her purse and headed for the door. “Think about it.”

* * *

Before I left the co-op I ran into Jack Stuart, who was clearing out the last of his personal belongings from the room he’d
formerly occupied on the second floor. Jack, the latest defector from the live-in contingent, had decided he needed a change
of scene after the disastrous breakup of a love affair last spring—a breakup in which I’d played an unfortunate but necessary
part. I helped him take his boxes out to his van, and then we shared some wine; I’d hoped he might give me an opinion on the
Suits situation, but Jack was more interested in discussing the color schemes he’d picked out for his new condo on Diamond
Heights. When I finally said good night to him, it was after nine, and I felt more isolated than ever.

You’ve got nobody to blame but yourself, McCone, I told myself as I drove toward home. This is the life you chose for yourself;
get used to it.

* * *

Most of the lights in my renovated earthquake cottage were blazing. I flicked off the overheads in the guest room and parlor
as I went down the hall. A mutter of voices came from the sitting room; I paused, listening. Damned if one didn’t sound like
a police dispatcher.