James Burke - Light of the World

There was only one problem: Clete had brought his own rain cloud with him, and he didn’t know how to make it go away without paying a price that so far he had not been willing to pay.

She ducked her head until she made his eyes meet hers. “You’re deep in thought,” she said.

“It’s my kid. I think she’s getting a bad deal.”

“With the sheriff?”

“People are trying to kill her, but she gets rousted. I’d call that a bad deal. This guy who ended up with a pistol ball in his head? What’s-his-name?”

“Tony Zappa. He was part of Love’s grounds crew.”

“That’s not all he was. When he wasn’t clipping hedges, he was raping the girlfriend of this character Wyatt Dixon.”

“I didn’t know him, Clete. Love hires ex-felons. I think that’s how he convinces himself all the other things he does don’t matter.”

“What other things?”

“Political intrigue. Despoiling the environment. Bribing Arabs. Whatever works. He grew up in a dirt-floor shack and thinks of the world as a shark tank.”

“Because guys like him are in it, that’s why.”

“What are you trying to tell me?”

“Somebody wants my daughter dead. She’s making a documentary that exposes some of Love Younger’s enterprises. What conclusion should I come to? In the meantime, this nutcase from Kansas is out there somewhere, and he’s probably got connections to the Younger family.”

“That’s not what you’re really trying to say, is it?”

Her hand rested on her plastic cup. There was moisture on the balls of her fingers, and he wanted to reach over and clasp her hand in his and warm it and protect her. But from what?

“I owe my kid,” he said. “Her father let her down. That’s me. Now I got a chance to make it right. I got the feeling I’m not doing a very good job of it.”

“Maybe you’d be doing a better job if you let go of me?”

She was wearing a peasant dress and a beret and tennis shoes and a thin jade necklace. She looked outrageous and mysterious, like an orphan girl who had wandered out of a nineteenth-century novel into the world of the rich and famous. Or was that simply an identity she had manufactured in order to turn a burnt-out bail-skip chaser into a sock puppet? If she was looking for a guy to use, why him? If you wanted a thoroughbred, you didn’t go to an elephant farm.

“I asked you a question, Clete. Do you want me to disappear from your life?” she said.

“Don’t say that.” The canvas awning swelled in the wind, popping loose from the aluminum frame that held it in place. The sunlight was blinding. “I care about you. I don’t want to let go of you. But I can’t forget that you’re married.” His face reddened when he realized how loud his voice was.

“You just noticed that I’m married? Somehow that got lost in your mental Rolodex?”

“You don’t want to leave him when he’s in mourning. I understand that,” he said. “But it doesn’t make me feel too good.”

She covered his hand with hers. “You haven’t done anything wrong. If anybody has done wrong, it’s me. I married Caspian because he was rich. I tried to convince myself otherwise, but that’s why I did it. It’s not his fault, it’s not yours, it’s not Love Younger’s, it’s not my father’s, it’s mine.”

“What are we going to do, kid?”

“I look like a kid to you?”

“Yeah, you do. I’m old, you’re young. You’re a gift that guys who look like me don’t receive too often.”

The color in her eyes deepened, and her face seemed to grow small and more vulnerable. He was sweating, even though the wind was cool; the sun seemed to be burning a hole through the top of his head. “We can go away,” she said. “Maybe for just a little while. Or maybe forever.”

“Go where?” he said.

“A friend of mine lets me use her ranch outside Reno. Her mother was an actress in western movies. It’s like going back to America in the 1940s. The view is wonderful. In the early mornings, you can smell the sage and flowers that only open at night. We could have such a grand time together.”

“I got to take care of my daughter. I got to help Dave.”

“It doesn’t matter. You’ll always be my big guy.”

“Let’s go somewhere. I mean now. Maybe the DoubleTree on the river.”

“I can’t. I told Love I’d go with him to visit Angel’s grave. He’s not doing very well.”

“He was close to your daughter?”

“In his way. He’s a private man and doesn’t show his feelings. He thinks of the world as his enemy. His real tragedy is he tries to control the people he loves most, and he destroys them one at a time.”

“Why didn’t you eighty-six this bunch a long time ago?” Clete said.

“Greed, selfishness, anger, because my father’s ideals were more important to him than I was. Take your pick.” She rose from her chair with her purse. “I’ve got to go. Caspian was suspicious when I left.”

“I hate that word. It makes me feel like a bucket of shit.”

“I’m sorry for using it.”

“Meet me tonight,” he said.

“I think bad things are going to happen to both of us, Clete.”

“In what way?”

“What’s the expression? ‘Our fate lies not in the stars but in ourselves.’ No matter what happens, I’ll always love and respect you. I wish we had met years ago.” Then she walked away.

He felt as though all the oxygen had been sucked out of his chest. He stared at her back as she walked to the end of the block, her dress swishing on her hips, her beret tilted on the side of her head. In seconds she was gone, like an apparition that had never been part of his life. He looked emptily at the street and took out his wallet to leave a tip on the table. That was when he saw Caspian Younger stepping into the intersection, after the traffic signal had turned red, crossing the street without looking at the cars, his face knotted with the rage of the cuckold or that of a dangerous drunk who had decided to sail across the Abyss.

As Caspian threaded his way through the people on the sidewalk, Clete could see the weakness in his chin, the petty and childlike look of injury around the mouth, the flaccid and tubular arms that had probably never picked up heavy weights or split wood with an ax, the hands that were incapable of becoming fists that could deliver a blow stronger than a mosquito bite. Caspian Younger had been one who was always shoved down in line, or stuffed headfirst into a toilet bowl in the boys’ room, or bailed out of trouble by his father and treated as an infant by his mother; he was one of those whose dreams were filled with bullies at whom he flailed his fists while they laughed in his face. He was also the kind who would pull a .25 auto from his pocket and park one between your eyes before you ever saw it coming.

Clete remained seated, raising one hand gently, avoiding eye contact. “Whoa,” he said.

“I warned you before,” Caspian said.

“You got a right to be mad, Mr. Younger. But not here. We can talk about it somewhere else.”

“I’ll decide that.”

“Yes, sir. That’s your right. But no good will come out of this. I say let it slide for now. I’ll stay out of your way.”

“You’re balling my wife and you dare lecture me? Where did she go?”

“Sorry, I don’t know.”

“She’s meeting you at a motel? Don’t tell me she isn’t. I know her pattern.”

“Time to turn the volume down, Mr. Younger.”

“Really? How’s this?” He picked up Clete’s iced tea and threw it in his face.

“I might do the same thing if I was in your shoes,” Clete said. He took out his handkerchief and wiped his face. “Maybe I’d do worse. None of this is on your wife. If there’s one person responsible, you’re looking at him. But I’m asking you to call it quits.”