John Verdon - Shut Your Eyes Tight

“Not bad. A mixed bag of attendees-all the basic types. There’s always the cautious group-the ones who wait and watch, who believe in saying as little as possible. The utilitarians, the ones who want to know exactly how they can use every fact you give them. The minimizers who want to know as little as possible, get involved as little as possible, do as little as possible. The cynics who want to prove that any idea that didn’t occur first to them is bullshit. And, of course, the ‘positives’-probably the best name for them-the ones who want to learn as much as they can, see more clearly, become better cops.” He felt comfortable talking, wanted to go on, but she was studying the dishwater again. “So… yeah,” he concluded, “it was an okay day. The ‘positives’ made it… interesting.”

“Men or women?”

“What?”

She lifted the spatula out of the water, frowning at it as though noticing for the first time how dull and scratched it was. “The ‘positives’-were they men or women?”

It was curious how guilty he could feel when, really, there was nothing to feel guilty about. “Men and women,” he replied.

She held the spatula up closer to the light, wrinkled her nose in disapproval, and tossed it into the garbage receptacle under the sink.

“Look,” he said. “About this morning. This business with Jack Hardwick. I think we need to start that discussion over again.”

“You’re meeting with the victim’s mother. What is there to discuss?”

“There are good reasons to meet with her,” he pressed on blindly. “And there may be some good reasons not to.”

“A very intelligent way of looking at it.” She seemed coolly amused. Or, at least, in an ironical mood. “Can’t talk about it right now, though. Don’t want to be late. For my book club.”

He heard a subtle emphasis on that last phrase-just enough, perhaps, to let him know she knew that he’d guessed. A remarkable woman, he thought. And despite his anxiety and exhaustion, he couldn’t help smiling.

As usual, Madeleine was first up the next morning.

Gurney awoke to the hiss and gurgle of the coffeemaker-along with the sinking realization that he’d forgotten to fix her bicycle brakes.

Hard upon that pang came a sense of uneasiness about his plan to meet later that morning with Val Perry. Although he’d emphasized to Jack Hardwick that his willingness to talk to her did not imply any further commitment-that the meeting was primarily a gesture of courtesy and condolence to someone who’d suffered a dreadful loss-a cloud of second thoughts was descending on him. Pushing them aside as best he could, he showered, dressed, and strode purposefully out through the kitchen to the pantry, mumbling good morning to Madeleine, who was sitting in her customary position at the breakfast table with a slice of toast in her hand and a book propped open in front of her. Slipping into his canvas barn jacket that he removed from its hook in the pantry, he went out the side door and headed for the tractor shed that housed their bicycles and kayaks. The sun had not yet appeared, and the morning was surprisingly raw for early September.

He rolled Madeleine’s bicycle out from behind the tractor into the light at the front of the open shed. The aluminum frame was shockingly cold. The two small wrenches he chose from the set on the shed wall were just as cold.

Cursing, twice banging his knuckles against the sharp edges of the front forks, the second time drawing blood, he adjusted the cables that controlled the position of the brake pads. Creating the proper clearance-allowing the wheel to move freely when the brake was disengaged, yet providing adequate pressure against the rim when the brake was applied-was a trial-and-error process that he had to repeat four times to get right. Finally, with more relief than satisfaction, he declared the job done, replaced the wrenches, and headed back to the house, one hand numb and the other aching.

Passing the woodshed and the adjacent pile of logs made him wonder for the tenth time in as many days, should he rent a wood-splitter or buy one? There were disadvantages either way. The sun was still not up, but the squirrels were already engaged in their morning attack on the bird feeders, raising another question that seemed to have no happy answer. And, of course, there was the matter of the manure for the asparagus.

He went into the kitchen and ran warm water over his hands.

As the stinging subsided, he announced, “Your brakes are fixed.”

“Thank you,” said Madeleine cheerily without looking up from her book.

Half an hour later-resembling a paint-by-numbers sunset in her lavender fleece pants, pink Windbreaker, red gloves, and an orange wool hat pulled down over her ears-she went out to the shed, mounted her bike, rode slowly and bumpily down the pasture path, and disappeared onto the town road beyond the barn.

Gurney spent the next hour on a mental review of the facts of the crime as they had been related to him by Hardwick. Each time he went over the scenario, he was increasingly troubled by its theatricality, its almost-operatic excess.

At 9:00 A.M. exactly, the time appointed for his meeting with Val Perry, he went to the window to see if she might be coming up the road.

Think of the devil and the devil arrives. In this case at the wheel of a Turbo Porsche in racing green-a model Gurney thought sold for around $160,000. The sleek vehicle crept past the barn, past the pond, slowly up the pasture hillside, to the small parking area next to the house, its hugely powerful engine purring softly. With a mixture of cautious curiosity and a bit more excitement than he’d want to admit, Gurney went out to greet his guest.

The woman who emerged from the car was tall and curvaceously slim, wearing a satiny cream blouse and satiny black pants. Her shoulder-length black hair was cut in a straight bob across her forehead like Uma Thurman’s in Pulp Fiction . She was, as Hardwick had promised, “drop-dead gorgeous.” But there was something more-a tension in her as striking as her looks.

She took in her surroundings with a few appraising glances that seemed to absorb everything and reveal nothing. An ingrained habit of circumspection , thought Gurney.

She walked toward him with the hint of a grimace-or was it the customary set of her mouth?

“Mr. Gurney, Val Perry. I appreciate your making time for me,” she said, extending her hand. “Or should I call you Detective Gurney?”

“I left the title in the city when I retired. Call me Dave.” They shook hands. The intensity of her gaze and strength of her grip surprised him. “Would you like to come inside?”

She hesitated, glancing around the garden and the small bluestone patio. “Can we sit out here?”

The question surprised him. Even though the sun was now well above the eastern ridge in a cloudless sky and most of the dew was gone from the grass, the morning was still chilly.

“Seasonal affective disorder,” she said with an explanatory smile. “Do you know what that is?”

“Yes.” He returned her smile. “I think I have a mild case of it myself.”

“I have more than a mild case. From this time of year on, I need as much light, preferably sun, as possible. Or I really do want to kill myself. So if you don’t mind, Dave, perhaps we could sit out here?” It wasn’t really a question.

The detective part of his brain, dominant and hardwired, unaffected by the technicality of retirement, wondered about her seasonal-disorder story, wondered if there was another reason. An eccentric control need, a desire to make others conform to her whims? A desire, for whatever reason, to keep him off balance? Neurotic claustrophobia? An effort to minimize the risk of being recorded? And if being recorded was a worry, did it have a practical or paranoid basis?