Bill Pronzini - The Lighthouse

“I want to get out of Hilliard. Go to California. L.A., maybe.”

“And do what? Try to get into the movies?”

“God, no! I may live in a hick town but that doesn’t mean I’m stupid. Nobody goes to Hollywood and gets rich and famous anymore; that’s a lot of shit. But I figure I could get by down there, and at least it’s sunny and warm.”

“How would you ‘get by’? By turning tricks?”

“What?”

“Prostitution, Mandy.”

“If I have to. That’s no big thing.”

Alix sighed.

“Anyway,” Mandy said, “I’ve got it figured out-the price of a bus ticket and enough money to keep me going until I can find a job or something. And what I’ve got to sell is worth just about what I’ll need.”

“Sell?”

“To you, Mrs. Ryerson.”

“Now what could you possibly have to sell to me?”

“Information. Something I heard.”

“What would that be?”

“Come on. If I told you, I wouldn’t have anything to sell.”

“Look, Mandy—”

“Five hundred dollars,” Mandy said. “Cash.”

“Five hundred-! That’s ridiculous!”

“You think so? Well, you’d better think twice, Mrs. Ryerson. What I heard could be important to you. Very important.”

The girl’s nerve was appalling. But Alix sensed a desperation underneath her hard demeanor; even though Mandy’s stance and tone of voice were aggressive, her fingers clenched and unclenched spasmodically. When she saw Alix looking at them she hid her hands in the folds of her poncho.

“Mandy,” Alix said, “do you know what the name for this sort of thing is?”

“Blackmail, so what?”

“Not blackmail. Extortion. You can be put in jail for it.”

“Don’t give me that. You’re not going to call the sheriff on me.”

“I could call your parents.”

The girl laughed. “Good luck. We’re so poor, we don’t even have a phone.”

“You just don’t realize what you’re doing to yourself, do you? In the first place, I’m not about to give you five hundred dollars, no matter what you think. In the second place, even if you did manage to get to Los Angeles, you’d probably live to regret it. There are men down there who prey on young girls like you—”

“Stop talking down to me! I know all about pimps and pushers, I know all I need to know. I’m not some stupid hick kid you can feel sorry for!”

Mandy’s face had reddened with this new outburst; for a moment Alix thought she was going to stamp her foot as she had in the launderette when her mother told her she couldn’t have a Coke. Instead, she spun away and stormed across the room to the door.

“Mandy—”

“No, you listen to me, Mrs. Ryerson. If you don’t get that money for me you’ll be sorry, you and your husband both. Real sorry.” And then she was gone, slamming the door behind her.

Alix went into the kitchen, stood uneasily watching the girl half-walk, half-run down to the gate. What could Mandy have heard that would lead her to hatch such a fantastic extortion scheme? What sort of “information” was worth five hundred dollars, even in her immature mind?

If you don’t get that money for me you’ll be sorry, you and your husband both. Real sorry.

What could she possibly know?

It was late Wednesday afternoon when he finally left Portland.

He had intended to leave much earlier, around two, but the garage where he’d taken the Ford to have the damage repaired had failed miserably in their promise to have the car ready by one; he’d spent most of the afternoon wandering through secondhand bookshops, looking for (and not finding) unfamiliar lighthouse material, and it was almost four by the time he finally ransomed the station wagon. Then he stopped at a place on S.E. 3rd that sold and serviced air compressors and picked up a tank for the one that operated the diaphone. It was rush hour by the time he finished there; it took him almost an hour to get out of the city and ten miles down Highway 5.

Freeway driving usually relaxed him, but not this evening. He felt tired, tense, grouchy, and the monotonous flow of miles did nothing to ease any of those feelings. He kept fiddling with the radio-not looking for anything but noise, yet not satisfied with call-in shows, news programs, or music of any kind. None of it kept him from thinking.

Yesterday’s examination by Dr. Philip R. Meade was one of the things that kept replaying in his mind, the primary thing. According to Meade, his condition-atrophying optic nerves in both eyes, aggravated by a form of “systemic choroiditis,” or disease of the middle layer of tissue deep inside the eye-had not advanced to any marked degree. But neither had it improved, of course. Prognosis: still negative. Meade had administered a cortisone treatment, even though the last ophthalmologist he’d consulted in California had told him the condition had advanced beyond the help of such treatments. The good doctor had also administered bland professional sympathies, the usual recommendations as to what the patient should and shouldn’t do, and a stronger codeine prescription to relieve the pain of his headaches.

Jan had asked him about blackouts, if they could become a symptom of his condition; he was careful not to admit that he had already had one, saying only that he “understood” they might be a by-product of intense eye-related headaches. Meade said blackouts were possible-given the rarity and seriousness of Jan’s particular eye disorder, many symptomatic complications were possible-but his professional opinion was that Mr. Ryerson need have no fear of “memory impairment,” especially if he avoided undue stress.

So much for Dr. Philip R. Meade.

He drove straight down Highway 5, mile after mile, mile after mile. And many more miles to go before I sleep. Traffic was thinning out, at least, now that rush hour was over, he could drive at a steady sixty-five, ten above the speed limit, but nobody observed the speed limit on Highway 5. Salem, Albany, Eugene, coming up on Cottage Grove. Coming up on nightfall, too, and still a hundred and fifty miles left to drive. Maybe he should stop for the night in Cottage Grove, or on down the road in Roseburg. Pack it in early, get an early start in the morning. No, he didn’t want to spend another night in a motel. Four strange walls, closed in and alone, and worse when he shut off the light. The dark. It was like being a child again-afraid of the dark.

Country-and-western music blaring at him from the radio. “She Got the Gold Mine, I Got the Shaft.” For God’s sake. Was that supposed to be amusing? He rotated the knob, found a classical station. Something heavy, ponderous-Bach fugue? Terrific, just what he needed. The knob again. Sports-talk program out of Eugene, somebody complaining about the Oregon Ducks football team being perennial losers and poor competition for Pac-10 powerhouses like USC and UCLA. Fine, good. Complain away, my friend, all your worries should be confined to ducks, Oregon or otherwise.

Pretty country on both sides of Cottage Grove, mountains rising, farms tucked away in the folds of the hills. But he couldn’t enjoy it. Roseburg next-and full dark when he got there. He turned off on Highway 42, the two-lane state road that connected Roseburg with Coos Bay on the coast. Sixty miles to Coquille, then a dozen miles on winding Highway 42-S to Bandon, then another twenty miles or so from there to Cape Despair. Close to a hundred miles altogether, part of it mountain driving, and already he felt fatigued and gritty-eyed.

Headache starting up, too. Just a small one, but he kept monitoring it, gauging its intensity, trying by force of will to prevent it from worsening. If it did get worse, if the bulging started, then he’d have to stop somewhere for the night. No more driving when he was suffering that way. Too dangerous-and he’d promised Alix.