Steve Hamilton - A Cold Day in Paradise

I WOKE UP a few hours later from a dreamless sleep. It felt like something beyond sleep, like a temporary total shutdown. It was late afternoon. I had never felt so hungry in my life.

I went outside with the broom and tried to sweep most of the glass out of my truck, knocked out the few fragments of glass that were still stuck in the window frame. I tried starting it. Nothing.

I threw the hood up and looked at the wiring. Just standing there, it all came back to me, the way I felt when I had tried to put the wires back, wondering how long I had to live. In my rush, I had gotten two of the wires crossed. I switched them and tried again. The truck started.

I left the truck running while I took a quick look around the place for my cellular phone, hoping he had just thrown it into the woods. When I came to the spot where I shot him, I stopped and looked down at the ground where he had fallen. There were pine needles on the ground, a few pine cones. I could have gotten down on my knees and looked for blood, but I didn’t. I just stood there and replayed it in my mind. He didn’t think my gun was real. Did that give me an unfair advantage? Should I have fired a warning shot into the trees? But then what would have happened? Would he have thrown his own gun down? Am I going to have to wonder about that now for the rest of my life?

There will be no trial, no chance to sit in a courtroom and hear an explanation for it all. FU never find out why he picked me.

Five or six months ago, they said. That’s when this all started. What did I do to him? Why was he so obsessed with me?

As I got back into the truck I felt a sharp sliver of glass slice through my finger. I pulled it out and looked at the thin line of blood. There is nothing so red as blood, nothing so simple. And I had seen quite enough of it for one lifetime.

I ordered a steak at the Glasgow, the biggest damned steak Jackie could find, medium rare, with grilled onions and mushrooms and four ice-cold Canadian beers. Jackie slipped me a quick smile. I think he knew I was on my way back. If I wasn’t quite myself yet, he knew it would only be a matter of time. I borrowed his phone, started to dial the phone company, then I realized it was probably too late in the day. I’d call them tomorrow to have my phone line restored. And an auto glass place to have my window replaced.

I sat there tapping my beer bottle for a few minutes and then I picked up the phone again. She answered on the third ring.

“Sylvia,” I said, “I’m just calling to make sure you’re okay.”

“Why wouldn’t I be okay?” she said. “I’m so okay I’m way past perfect.”

Her voice wasn’t right. “Are you drunk?”

“I’m way past drunk,” she said. “I’m just sitting here in this big old house on the edge of the world all by myself getting way past drunk.”

“Do you want me to come out there?”

“Why would I want you to come out here?”

“Because you shouldn’t be alone.”

“Why shouldn’t I be alone?”

“Because you shouldn’t. Damn it, Sylvia, you came all the way out to my cabin last night. Why did you do that?”

“You know, that’s a good question. I’m not sure why I came out there. But obviously it was such a wonderful thing to do. Another brilliant turning point in my life. I got to meet the man who killed my husband, after all. Well no, I didn’t get to meet him really. I did get to see him on the ground with half his head blown off.”

“You didn’t want to be alone,” I said. “That’s why you came to my cabin, all right? It’s okay. After everything that’s happened, there’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Yes there is, Alex. There’s something very wrong with that. I’m not sure what, but I’m sure if I think about it-Christ, where did that bottle go?”

“I’m coming out there.”

“So help me God,” she said. Suddenly, she sounded sober. “If you come here I will kill you. I will kill you or I will kill myself. Or I will kill both of us. And believe me, I can do that now. I’ve been watching the experts.”

“All right, Sylvia,” I said. “All right. Take it easy.”

“Don’t tell me to take it easy. Just leave me alone. You got that? Leave me the fuck alone.”

I didn’t know what else to say. I closed my eyes and listened to the faint sound of her breathing.

“What have we done, Alex?” she finally said, her voice drained of all emotion. “What have we done?”

She hung up before I could answer. I just sat there with the phone in my hand. And then I had Jackie bring me another beer.

A couple hours later, I was back at my cabin. It was dark. I walked around the outside of the cabin a couple times. I couldn’t bring myself to believe that nobody was watching me anymore, that nobody was waiting to kill me.

My gun. I didn’t have my gun anymore. It was still at the police station. But that was okay. I didn’t need it anymore, right?

I went inside and found the phone book. I tried to look up Raymond Julius. He had no listing.

Five or six months ago. What happened five or six months ago?

You’re not going to figure this out tonight, Alex. Just go to bed. You need to cut some wood tomorrow, clean up the place. Get some food in the house, for God’s sake. Become a human being again.

I slept. Two hours, maybe three. And then I sat up in my bed and turned on the light. It was just past midnight.

Five or six months ago.

The phone book was still on the kitchen table. I paged through it until I found Leon Prudell. The address was in Kinross, a little town south of the Soo, down by the airport. I threw some clothes on and got in the truck. With the cold air whipping through the open window I raced toward Kinross. It was late, but Leon and I had something to talk about.

It didn’t take long to find his house. Kinross is almost as small as Paradise, one main road and a few side streets. It was a little clapboard house, not much bigger than my cabin. There was a faint smell of dead fish in the air. A tire swing hung from a tree in the front yard.

I knocked on the door, waited, knocked again. Finally the porch light came on and a woman looked around the door at me. “Who is it?” she said.

“I need to speak to your husband,” I said.

“He’s not here. Who are you?”

I thought for a second. “I want to hire him,” I said. “I understand he’s a private investigator.”

“He was doing investigations,” she said, “but he don’t do that no more.”

“I hear he’s good,” I said. “Are you sure he won’t take a case? I’ll pay five hundred dollars a day.”

That got her to open the door all the way. I saw a lot of woman and a lot of red bathrobe. The way she was built, I was glad that Leon had come after me in the bar that night and not her. “He’s working up at the truck stop on I-75 tonight,” she said. “In the restaurant.”

“The one by the Route 28 exit?”

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

“I appreciate it, ma’am.”

“He works nights,” she said. “Ever since he lost the investigating job.”

“I see.”

“Do you know a guy named Alex McKnight?”

“Can’t say that I do,” I said.

“That’s the man who got him fired. You see him, you tell him he’s an asshole, okay?”

“I’ll do that, ma’am. I’m sorry I had to disturb you at this hour.”

“For five hundred dollars a day, you can disturb me anytime you want.”

“Thank you, ma’am. Good night.”

I got out of there and made my way back to the highway. The truck stop was a few miles north on 1-75, one of those places you see from the road, lit up all night long, a hundred trucks gassing up or just sitting there while the drivers have their apple pie and coffee.