Bill Pronzini: Breakdown

There was an edge in me now, but not the bad kind; a controlled excitement, a sense that thanks to Kerry I might be nearing that final closing off. “I’d better go out there and check on this right away,” I. said.

“You won’t take any chances?”

“No.”

“I mean, if Pendarves is at Mikan’s and he’s the one who shot Coleman Lujack, he’ll probably be armed.”

“I know. I’ll go slow and easy.”

On my way Out There at the Beach, I did some more thinking about Nick Pendarves and Douglas Mikan. At first consideration, they seemed like strange bedfellows. Pendarves — blue-collar, minimally educated and unsophisticated, no interests beyond his work, his bar time, maybe some TV, and a hooker now and then to satisfy his biological needs. Mikan- white-collar, younger by more than fifteen years, sensitive, intelligent, probably asexual, interested in chess and history and world travel and any number of other things. When you looked a little more closely, though, there were similarities between the two, and strong character traits in each that made it natural they would gravitate to each other. Both were loners, yet both craved the company of others; their “regulars” status at the Hideaway proved that. One was an abuser who didn’t care if he was liked or respected, just so long as he got what he wanted. The other was withdrawn, malleable, a man-child who had been cast adrift by his mother’s death and who would typically yearn to be needed as she had needed him…. All in all, a perfect foil for an abusive personality.

Pendarves and Mikan-why hadn’t I seen it before? Too busy trying to make things fit into convenient patterns; and too willing to accept a sexual stereotype, as Kerry had pointed out. A product of my generation, that was me. Even though I did not believe in any form of sexism, fought against it in others, there were times when I was as unintentionally piggy as Eberhardt. …

Between Taraval and Sloat Boulevard, before the Great Highway enters its newly landscaped stretch, its east side is just another strip of mismatched private residences. Number 2316 was one of them-a weathered, green-shingled cottage squeezed so tightly between a two-unit apartment building and a two-story house that it looked as though it was trapped there. A concrete walk bordered by two neat, slender rows of artichoke plants led in to it. Across its narrow front porch was a wrought-iron security gate. And in one of the facing windows, a light showed palely behind drawn monk’s cloth drapes.

I felt a momentary longing for Vega’s.38. But it was just as well that I had turned it over to the police last night. I wouldn’t need a weapon if I handled things right. There was no reason I had to bring Pendarves in myself; all I had to do was determine his presence, get away clean, and notify the authorities. I ought to be able to tell if he was there by trying to talk my way inside-Art Canino come from the Hideaway to find out if Douglas was feeling all right, since he hadn’t been in the past few evenings-and then gauging Mikan’s reaction. It would work if I was careful and did or said nothing to arouse suspicion.

A stiff sea wind beat at me as I got out of the car. No fog out here today, and none lying in wait offshore; the sky was coldly clear to the horizon, turning a dusky indigo now as the last of the sunset colors bled out of it. I let the wind push me along the walk to where the gate barred my way. It wasn’t quite latched, I saw then. But I didn’t touch it. I stopped and laid my finger on a round white button set into the frame.

No one buzzed me in. Or opened the front door. Or showed himself behind either of the curtained windows.

Empty house? Or somebody in there, hiding?

I rang the bell continuously for part of a minute. Then I pushed on the gate, and it swung inward, and I climbed three steps onto the narrow little porch. Carefully I tried the door, using two fingers on the knob; it was locked. I banged on the panel, loudly, and called Mikan’s name, identifying myself as Art Canino. Still no answer.

If I break in, I thought, and they’re in there, Pendarves is liable to start shooting. But it’s just as likely there’s nobody home. Otherwise, why wasn’t the security gate locked tight? And why wouldn’t Mikan just answer the door, find out what I wanted, and then get rid of me? Keep me from coming back again, that way. And ease their minds about why I’d come.

Just as likely, too, that Pendarves is dead and this is a wild-goose chase. Don’t forget that.

I bent for a close look at the door latch, and that made up my mind. People nowadays think a security gate and window bars are all the protection they need, so they don’t bother to put dead-bolt locks on the doors. Then they leave the house and go away and forget to make sure the gate is secure. No wonder the burglary rate in this city was so damned high.

With one of the blades in my pocket knife, I tripped the spring lock. Took me less than thirty seconds. I went in slow and wary, but not being furtive about it.

Nothing happened.

Nobody home.

I let out a long breath, shut the door, stood looking around. I was in a tiny foyer that opened on my left into a living room lit by a ginger-jar table lamp. And what a living room it was. The furnishings were few and functional, of the forties Sears, Roebuck type but well preserved and gleaming with polish; the carpet was rose-patterned, threadbare in places, very clean. That much was ordinary. The rest of the room was extraordinary: It assailed the eye in a riot of color and imagery.

Postcards. Picture postcards.

There must have been thousands of them covering every inch of wall space, fanned out on top of the furniture, hanging from the ceiling on lengths of white ribbon like bright flypaper strips or homemade mobiles. Most looked to be of recent vintage and the photographic, wish-you-were-here sort, depicting scenes from foreign lands and the more interesting parts of the U.S. There were also hand-painted cards, some evidently quite old; poster and advertising cards; cards featuring boats, trains, other forms of transportation; cards showing people, animals, birds, monuments, buildings. Holiday cards, religious cards, patriotic cards, novelty cards … just about every conceivable type of picture postcard ever manufactured except the erotic and the pornographic. Nearly all of the hanging ones had been written on and sent through the mail; one of the old cards, of the Steel Globe Tower at Coney Island, bore a 1907 postmark. I glanced at the names of the senders and addressees on a few of the others. None had been written by or sent to Douglas Mikan, nor by or to anyone bearing his family name. Only one had been mailed to someone in San Francisco; the others bore such far-flung addresses as Baltimore, London, and Fiji.

He buys them through dealers, I thought, or picks them up in junk shops and secondhand stores. And they’re more than just a hobby; they’re his secret fantasy life. All the places he’s never been and probably will never go. Other peoples’ dreams fulfilled, shared vicariously and long after the fact by a sad, shy, lonely little man named Douglas Mikan.

I turned out of there, made my way down a central hallway. But there was no getting away from the postcards; they were everywhere, on every wall including those in the hallway, bathroom, and kitchen. The place was alive with them … and yet there was no life in them, only the static memory of life. It was like wandering through a mausoleum filled with bright, shiny, two-dimensional corpses.

Two doors off the hall were shut. The first one opened into what must be Douglas’s bedroom: as neat and clean as the rest of the place, the bed made up with military precision, the concentration of postcards the heaviest. He’d affixed some directly to the ceiling-his favorites, I thought, so he could lie in bed at night and look up at them and dream his impossible dreams. On the dresser was a big silver-framed photograph of a pinch-faced, unsmiling woman with gray hair and hard little eyes. His mother. If the photo was an accurate reflection of the woman herself, ii was little wonder he’d turned out the way he had.