John Lutz - Spark

“Use your reasoning ability,” she said sternly. “If what you say was true, I’d have been murdered by now.”

“No, whoever killed Jerome and Maude would almost surely wait. A man dies, then his grief-stricken mistress hangs herself. Okay, that’s believable enough. But if his widow also commits suicide, or dies an even slightly suspicious accidental death, credulity is stretched and the law might investigate and find enough threads to weave a rope.”

“So I’m not in any danger, even if your theory happens to be correct.”

“I think you might be in danger. There’s some indication the people involved in this don’t always behave rationally. And who knows what they’ll consider a reasonable amount of time?”

Hard resolution brightened her eyes. “Danger or not, Mr. Carver, I’m not leaving here to go into hiding like a fugitive. Regardless of what secret Jerome learned-if any-I’m not about to be chased from my home.”

Carver placed both hands on his cane and stood up. “You’ve convinced me, Hattie. Will you help to put my mind at ease by promising you’ll be careful to keep your doors and windows locked, and leave a light on if you go out at night?”

“I always do both those thing, Mr. Carver.” She stood up and walked with him to the door. “Let me know if you need additional payment. I appreciate the job you’re doing on this. You’ve gone much further than the police would have, I’m sure.”

“I’m sure, too,” Carver said. He opened the front door. “There’s no need for further payment right now.”

“I don’t want you working on this investigation because you feel sorry for an old lady, Mr. Carver.”

He grinned. “You’re anything but an object of pity, Hattie.”

She thought about what he’d said and smiled.

Instead of walking to his car, Carver crossed the green expanse of lawn to Val’s house. He glanced over to make sure Hattie wasn’t observing him, then punched the doorbell with his cane.

It took Val several minutes to come to the door. He was barefoot, wearing dark slacks and an unbuttoned white shirt. The shirt had widely spaced, intersecting creases, as if it had been recently bought and not yet washed and ironed. The house was dim behind Val, and he was squinting into the outside light in a way that made him look more than ever like a leprechaun.

Carver said, “Wake you up?”

“Yeah, but that’s okay; I was gonna get up anyway. Just taking a little nap. Patrol again tonight.” He stepped back. “Wanna come in? Hotter’n a whore in heat out there.”

Carver hadn’t heard that one, but then he hadn’t spent months on Posse patrol on the mean streets of Solartown, as had Rathawk Two. He followed Val into the dim living room and watched him open the blinds enough to let in a bearable amount of light. It illuminated the dust.

“Wanna beer?” he asked Carver. Sure.

Val disappeared into the kitchen. While he was in there clattering around, Carver looked over the living room. It was laid out like Hattie’s, with the door to the left of the picture window, door to the hall and kitchen directly opposite it. The wall-to-wall carpet was predictably green. The furniture was early American and functional; where there was upholstery, it was plaid. A wooden bookshelf contained a row of paperback espionage novels-which explained Val’s knowledge of Russian assassination methods-and a statue of a horse, and a bowling trophy. Near a recliner the remote control for the console TV lay on the carpet, along with a scattering of what looked like popcorn. The fireplace had a small folding screen set up in front of its cavity, on which was a print of that famous painting of dogs playing poker. Carver thought the place could use a woman’s touch.

Val had returned with two cans of Bud Light and caught Carver eyeballing the living room.

“Decor ain’t for shit,” Val said, handing Carver one of the beers, “but it’s clean and comfortable.”

“All you could reasonably require,” Carver said. He wasn’t hypocritical enough to criticize Rathawk Two’s taste in furnishings and accessories. He’d always liked that dog painting and sort of wished he owned one.

He took a sip of beer so cold it must have been within a few degrees of freezing. “Good,” he said, licking foam from his upper lip. “I just came from next door.”

Val sat in the recliner but didn’t tilt it back. “So how’s Hattie?”

“She’s doing okay, but I’m a little worried about her. Maybe the Posse, and you in particular, could keep a watch on her house.”

“Sure. She in some kinda danger?”

“I think so. She doesn’t.”

Val scratched his side beneath the unbuttoned shirt and chuckled. “That’s Hattie for you.”

“I figure maybe Jerome Evans knew something, and maybe he told Maude Crane-”

“And maybe somebody thinks he mighta told Hattie.” Val finished Carver’s sentence. “Anything I can do,” he said, “I will.”

Carver took another pull of beer. “When you’re on patrol at night, you ever find yourself in the medical center?”

“Yep. Now and then we drive folks there when they’re having some kinda problem that’s serious but don’t require an ambulance.”

“It’d help me, and Hattie, if I had copies of their paperwork dealing with one of their suppliers, Keller Pharmaceutical.”

Val leaned back and considered, His sleep-puffed eyes glanced in the direction of Hattie’s house. He said, “You’re asking a lot here, Carver.”

“I know.” He told Val why he needed the information.

“You dead sure this’ll help Hattie?” Val asked.

“No, but it might.”

“Helluva risk.”

“Life’s a helluva risk.”

Val leaned back and pressed his cold Bud can to his forehead, rolling it slowly back and forth, mulling things over. Carver rooted for the power of true love.

“I’m on good terms with one of the volunteers there,” Val said after a while. “She owes me a favor and she might have access to the files. I can ask her, anyways.”

“When?”

“Tonight, I guess.”

“You sure she can keep quiet about this?”

“No need to worry on that account. Be hell to pay if word ever got out. Even if the medical center didn’t prosecute, she’d lose her job same as I’d lose mine with the Posse if either one of us came down with a loose tongue.”

Neither man talked as they finished their beers. Maybe it was that remark about loose tongues.

What have I done? Carver wondered, as he left Val’s cool, dim house and limped through the heat toward where the Olds was parked. His arms were already glistening with sweat, his grip on his cane slippery.

Had he placed two more senior citizens in harm’s way for nothing?

Would he live to become a senior citizen?

Adam Beed, wearing bib overalls, was driving a gigantic threshing machine toward Carver, grinning, standing up at the controls so he could look down and watch the blades snare and dismember his prey. Carver was trying to run through the wheat field with his cane, but he kept stumbling, falling, getting up to look back in terror and see that the whirring blades were closer. Beed raised his right hand and flailed the air with it, holding something-a bell! Carver could hear it now above the roar of the thresher’s engine. He tripped and fell, struggled to his feet. The bell . . .

Carver woke up sweating, snatched up the phone to quiet its nerve-grating jangle. He peered at the ghostly red numerals of the clock by the bed: three minutes past midnight. He’d been asleep only a few hours.

“Carver? You there?”

Rathawk Two. “Somewhere,” Carver mumbled, touching the cool plastic receiver to his ear.