Linwood Barclay - A Tap on the Window

Did Hanna know her boyfriend was so interested in finding Claire? Was Sean Skilling the guy in the pickup Claire was trying to get away from? But would Hanna have helped Claire pull a disappearing act so her own boyfriend would stop stalking her? Did that make any sense at all?

“Okay, well, if you see her, call me?” Sean asked.

Nods all around. A young man in a black T-shirt with a Batman insignia on it asked, “Hey, can I place an order with you for Saturday night?”

“Not right now, man.”

Sean spotted someone else he knew in the far corner of the room. I didn’t see much need to eavesdrop on another conversation that was going to be the same as the previous two, and besides, there was no place over there where I could lurk undetected.

I watched Sean ask some questions of a young man who was sitting at a table, wiping chicken wing sauce off his fingers with a moistened napkin. The man shook his head, and Sean nodded. Then he turned, scanned the room for anyone else he might know. Spotted a waitress, stopped her as she was crossing the room with two pitchers on a tray that she was balancing just above her shoulder. She shook her head, moved on.

Sean Skilling stood there, as if wondering what to do. He dug into his jacket for his cell phone, probably checking for a text or message he might not have heard come in, then shoved the phone back into his pocket.

He headed for the door.

I set my beer on the closest table and went out after him.

He was about to round the corner of the building when I called out to him. “Sean!”

He whirled around, squinted at me. “Yeah?”

“Sean Skilling?”

“Who the hell are— Do I know you?”

“I’m Cal Weaver.”

He cocked his head at a funny angle. “Weaver?”

“That’s right.”

“Scott’s dad.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“You’re, like, the private dick guy.” Emphasis on the word you’d expect.

“Yeah,” I said.

He shook his head violently and raised a hand, palm out. “I don’t know anything about anything.”

“You don’t even know what I want to ask you about.”

“It’s about Scott, right? I got nothing to tell you.”

“I’m not here about him. I’m trying to find Claire Sanders.”

His mouth opened, but nothing came out for a second. “What the hell have you got to do with that?”

I heard the bar door open and close behind me, a couple laughing as they walked across the street.

“Sean, listen to me. I need to talk to Hanna. I think Hanna might know where Claire is. The police are trying to find her.”

He waved a hand at me. “Fuck you, pal.”

I took a step toward him. “I’m not out to cause trouble for you. I just want to make sure Claire’s okay. Where can I find Hanna? Is she with Claire?”

I heard the door open again behind me, the brief cacophony of voices and music spilling out into the night air.

“Come on,” I pleaded. “We’ll go someplace quieter, get a coffee, you can fill me in.”

Sean Skilling laughed. “Yeah, like I’m going to go someplace with you, you fucking psycho.”

I thought I caught him looking past my shoulder for half a second. I glanced that way as someone yelled, “Take off, man!” I didn’t move quickly enough to stop the fist from connecting, though I did get an arm up in time to partly deflect it. But the blow still caught me in the side of the head, and I went down before I could get any kind of look at my attacker.

As I hit the ground, non-celestial stars swirling before my eyes, I heard two sets of footsteps running off in opposite directions.

“Fucking hell,” I muttered, putting a hand to the side of my head. I’d landed on my back. I rolled over and brought myself up to my knees, making sure the world wasn’t rotating too speedily before I got to my feet. From the parking lot, I heard the growl of a pickup, then the squeal of tires as the truck shifted from loose gravel to pavement.

“You okay?”

Standing over me was a heavyset woman, mid-sixties, gray hair hanging straight down to her shoulders in a style she probably hadn’t changed in four decades. She gave me a grin.

“Looks like you just got your ass whupped. Why don’t you come in, we’ll see if you’re in need of medical attention. My name’s Phyllis. I own this dump. And I think I got a pretty good idea who you are.”

Phyllis led me back through Patchett’s, behind the counter, and into an office. I briefly considered protesting, telling her I was fine. But first, she had a viselike grip on my arm. And second, I thought she’d be worth talking to. As we passed the guy who’d handed me my Corona, she said, “Get me some ice in a towel, Bill, for Sam Spade here.

“Have a seat,” she ordered, releasing her grasp on me and pointing to a leather couch across from a desk. I sat. Bill appeared with a red-and-white-checkered towel in which he’d collected half a dozen ice cubes.

“Put that on your noggin,” Phyllis said. I took the towel and held it against my temple, which, I had to admit, was throbbing. As Bill left and closed the door behind him, Phyllis parked her butt on the edge of the desk and held up a fist in front of my eyes.

“How many fingers am I holding up?”

“That’s funny,” I said.

She extended the middle one. “How about now?”

“One.”

She laughed. “I think you’ll live. But you keep that ice on there. Head injuries are no joke. Remember how Mannix got knocked out nearly every week? That guy should have been brain-damaged.”

“I’m guessing the Mannix and Sam Spade references mean you know what I do for a living,” I said.

She nodded. “I recognized you when I saw you lying down there. You’re Cal Weaver.”

“And you’re Phyllis...”

“Phyllis Pearce.”

“If we’ve met before, I’m sorry, but I don’t remember.”

“We haven’t,” she said, shaking her head. “But I’ve seen you around. I make a point of knowing who everybody in Griffon is. Lived here my whole life, so whenever a new face comes to town, I ask who it belongs to. You moved here, what, eight, ten years ago?”

“Six,” I said.

“Sorry about your boy,” she said.

I raised my head slowly to look her in the eye. “Thanks.”

“Could have been anybody, you know.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Could have been anybody who sold him those drugs.” I must have looked surprised at what she seemed to be implying she knew, and it made her smile. “I hear you’ve been asking around. That what you were doing here tonight?”

“No,” I said.

“Because,” she said, talking right over my denial, “I can’t have that. You want to go around interrogating kids about what happened to your boy — and I don’t blame you one bit in that regard — you can’t be doing it on my premises. Starting a fight on my front steps, I won’t have that. You do what you have to do, but don’t be causing any trouble on my turf.”

“I didn’t start a fight,” I said, feeling like some kid telling his mother he was blameless. “And that’s not why I’m here.” I took the ice away from my head for a second. “I’m looking for Claire Sanders.”

“The mayor’s kid?”

“Yeah.”

“That who slugged you out there? Some little thing of a girl?”

“No. I don’t know who it was. I was coldcocked. I wanted to talk to a kid named Sean Skilling. You seem to know everyone around here, so you probably know that name.”

“Ford dealer’s kid.”

“Yeah.” I paused. The ice was so cold it was starting to hurt, but I held it in place. “I should take you on as a partner, you know so much of what goes on. Save me a lot of legwork.”