Jonathan Kellerman - Devil's Waltz

A dining room papered in a brown mini-print led to a white-tile and oak kitchen large enough to accommodate a distressed pine table and four chairs. The appliances were chrome-fronted and spotless. Glassed cabinets revealed neatly stacked crockery and size-ordered glass-ware. The dish drainer was empty; the counters, bare.

The window above the sink was a greenhouse affair filled with painted clay pots stuffed with summer flowers and herbs. A larger window to the left afforded a view of the backyard. Flagstone patio, rectangular pool covered with blue plastic and fenced with wrought iron. Then a long, perfect strip of grass, interrupted only by a wooden play-set, that ended at a hedge of orange trees espaliered against a six-foot cinder-block wall. Beyond the wall the ubiquitous mountains hung like drapery. Maybe miles away, maybe yards. I tried to get some perspective, couldn’t. The grass began looking like a runway to eternity.

She said, “Please, have a seat.”

Setting a place mat before me, she put a tall glass of iced tea upon it. “Just a mix — hope that’s all right.” Before I could answer, she returned to the refrigerator and touched the door.

I drank and said, “It’s fine.”

She picked up a washcloth and ran it over clean counter tiles, avoiding my eyes.

I sipped a bit, waited till we finally made contact, and tried another smile.

Her return smile was quick and tight and I thought I saw some color in her cheeks. She tugged her shirt down, kept her legs pressed together as she wiped the counter some more, washed the cloth, rung it out, folded it. Held it in both hands as if unsure what to do with it.

“So,” she said.

I looked out at the mountains. “Beautiful day.”

She nodded, snapped her face to the side, cast a downward glance, and placed the washcloth over the faucet spout. She ripped a square of paper towel from a wooden roller and began wiping the spigot. Her hands were wet. A Lady Macbeth thing or just her way of dealing with the tension?

I watched her clean some more. Then she gave another downward look and I followed it. To her chest. Nipples poking sharply through the thin black cotton of her shirt, small but erect.

When she looked up, my eyes were elsewhere.

“She should be up soon,” she said. “She usually sleeps from about one to two.”

“Sorry for coming so early.”

“Oh, no, that’s okay. I wasn’t doing anything anyway.”

She dried the spigot and stowed the paper towel in a wastebasket beneath the sink.

“While we wait,” I said, “do you have any questions about Cassie’s development? Or anything else?”

“Um... not really.” She bit her lip, polished the faucet. “I just wish I... someone could tell me what’s going on — not that I expect you to.”

I gave a nod, but she was looking out the greenhouse window and didn’t notice it.

Suddenly she leaned over the sink on tiptoe and adjusted one of the potted plants. Her back was to me and I saw her shirt ride up, revealing a couple of inches of tight waist and spine-knob. As she puttered, her long hair swayed like a horsetail. The stretch made her calves ride up and her thighs tighten. She straightened the pot, then another, stretched farther, and fumbled. One of the planters fell, hitting the rim of the sink, shattering, and showering planter’s mix onto the floor.

She was down on all fours in an instant, scooping and collecting. Dirt crusted her hands and streaked her shorts. I got up but before I could help her, she bounded to her feet, hurried to a utility closet and retrieved a broom. Her sweeping was hard and angry. I tore a paper square off the roller and handed it to her after she put the broom away.

She was flushed now, and her eyes were wet. She took the towel without looking at me. Wiping her hands, she said, “I’m sorry — I have to go change.”

She left the kitchen through a side door. I used the time to walk around the room, opening drawers and doors and feeling like an imbecile. Nothing more ominous in the cupboards than housekeeping aids and convenience foods. I looked out the door through which she’d left, found a small bathroom and service porch, and checked them out too. Washer and dryer, cabinets choked with detergents and cleansers, softeners and brighteners — a treasury of things promising to make life shiny and sweet-smelling. Most of them toxic, but what did that prove?

I heard footsteps and hurried back to the table. She came in wearing a loose yellow blouse, baggy jeans, sandals — her hospital uniform. Her hair was loosely braided and her face looked scrubbed.

“Sorry. What a klutz,” she said.

She walked to the refrigerator. No independent movement from her chest region, no nipples.

“More iced tea?”

“No, thanks.”

She took a can of Pepsi, popped it open, and sat down facing me.

“Did you have a nice ride over?”

“Very nice.”

“It’s good when there’s no traffic.”

“Yes, it is.”

“I forgot to tell you, they closed off the pass to widen the road...”

She continued to talk. About the weather and gardening, creasing her forehead.

Working hard at being casual.

But she seemed a stranger in her home. Talking stiffly, as if she’d rehearsed her lines but had no confidence in her memory.

Out the big window, the view was static as death.

Why were they living here? Why would Chuck Jones’s only son choose exurban quarantine in his own faltering housing development when he could have afforded to live anywhere?

Proximity to the junior college didn’t explain it. Gorgeous ranchland and plenty of country-club communities dotted the west end of the Valley. And funk-chic was still alive in Topanga Canyon.

Some kind of rebellion? A bit of ideology on Chip’s part — wanting to be part of the community he planned to build? Just the kind of thing a rebel might use to dampen any guilt over making big profits. Though, from the looks of it, profits were a long way off.

Another scenario fit, too: abusive parents often secreted their families from the prying eyes of potential rescuers.

I became aware of Cindy’s voice. Talking about her dishwasher, letting out words in a nervous stream. Saying she rarely used it, preferred gloving up and using steaming water so that the dishes dried almost instantly. Getting animated, as if she hadn’t talked to anyone in a long time.

She probably hadn’t. I couldn’t imagine Chip sitting around for chitchat about housework.

I wondered how many of the books in the living room were hers. Wondered what the two of them had in common.

When she paused for breath, I said, “It really is a nice house.”

Out of context, but it perked her up.

She gave a big smile, sloe-eyed, lips moist. I realized how good-looking she could be when she was happy.

“Would you like to see the rest of it?” she said.

“Sure.”

We retraced our steps to the dining room and she pulled pieces of wedding silver out of a hutch and showed them to me, one by one. Next came the book-lined living room, where she talked about how hard it had been to find skilled carpenters to build solid shelving, no plywood. “Plywood gasses out — we. want the house to be as clean as possible.”

I pretended to listen while inspecting the books’ spines.

Academic texts: sociology, psychology, political science. A bit of fiction, but none of it dated after Hemingway.

Interspersed among the volumes were certificates and trophies. The brass plate on one was inscribed: SINCERE THANKS TO MR. C. L. JONES III, FROM LOURDES HIGH SCHOOL ADVANCED PLACEMENT CLUB. YOU SHOWED US THAT TEACHING AND LEARNING WERE JUST PART OF FRIENDSHIP. Dated ten years ago.

Right below it was a scroll presented by the Yale Tutorial Project to CHARLES “CHIP” JONES FOR DEDICATED SERVICES TO THE CHILDREN OF THE NEW HAVEN FREE CLINIC.