Linwood Barclay - Too Close to Home

“I guess that’s one way of looking at it,” I said.

“Well, that’s ridiculous,” Ellen said. “No matter what you might think of him, he’s not capable of being involved with that.”

I said, “There has to be some reason why someone killed the Langleys.”

“It’s not the one you’re hinting at. This is over the top, Jim.”

“I’m not hinting at anything,” I said, my skin prickling under my collar. “But it was kind of interesting, talking to Agnes, about her son. And then I talked to his high school English teacher.”

“You called his high school teacher?”

“I went by and saw him. Walter Burgess.”

“Christ, you get around,” Ellen said. “You’re a regular Sam Spade.”

I didn’t detect any admiration beneath the sarcasm. “The kid was some kind of boy wonder. A genius. And that wasn’t just his mother talking. It was his teacher, too. He was a brilliant writer. Mature beyond his years, as they say.”

“I see.”

“So I think, even if it may not mean anything, I have to let Barry know that computer may be missing, and that one of the things on it was that book, which appears to have been written long before Conrad’s book came out.”

There was silence at the other end of the line.

“Ellen?” I said.

“I’m here. Here’s what I think, whether you like it or not. Conrad’s entitled to know about this, to offer some theory as to how this might have happened, before we talk to Barry. Telling Barry about this could do tremendous damage to Conrad’s reputation. Spark all sorts of rumors and innuendo.”

“I’m not trying to spark rumor or innuendo.”

“Bullshit,” Ellen snapped. “You’ve never let it go. You think there’s a chance now, after all these years, to get back at Conrad.”

“That’s not true,” I said, and almost even believed it.

“You’re suggesting he ripped off this boy’s novel.”

“I just think Barry should know everything there is to know, that’s all.”

“You have no idea what else the police may have already uncovered. They may already have a suspect, for all you know. Look at the kind of work Albert did. Representing all sorts of lowlifes. Lots of people could have had a grudge against him. He pissed off a lot of people when he got criminals off. Maybe somebody Albert didn’t get off was holding a grudge. Or somebody mad about someone Albert did get off.”

I thought about everything Ellen had said. There was a lot of truth in it. I had no idea what else the police investigation was turning up. Barry wasn’t exactly updating me.

“Okay,” I conceded. “Everything you say is true. And it may well be that Barry won’t give two shits about this information. But I think he should have it just the same.”

“It’s just that,” Ellen said, her voice softening, “whatever Conrad might have been years ago, all he is now is my boss. I have a good job. A job that means a lot to me.”

“I know.”

“On top of that, Conrad’s Thackeray’s literary darling. The whole festival’s built around him.”

“I know that, too.”

“It’d be bad enough for my job if his reputation were unfairly smeared. Imagine how bad it’d be if we’re the ones doing the smearing.”

“I hear you.”

“We need my job,” Ellen said. “It pays the bills.”

So there it was.

“And mine doesn’t,” I said.

“I never said that,” Ellen said quickly. “That came out wrong. I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

“Sure,” I said.

“For fuck’s sake,” Ellen said, “I take it back. I was an asshole. I’m sorry.”

I said nothing.

“Listen, all I’m saying is, let’s know what we’re dealing with before we talk to Barry. Let’s talk to Conrad first.”

“What would you have me do?” I asked, ending my silence. “Stroll into his big office and say, ‘Hey, did you plagiarize from one of your students years ago?’”

“The thing is, this is why I called you in the first place. He’s here. With Illeana. They stopped by. You know that thing he does, walking into houses without knocking? He just about gave me a heart attack.”

“You hadn’t locked the door? After what happened?”

“I thought you’d locked the door when you left. Anyway, I’m in the kitchen, he walks in, and I guess I screamed.”

Conrad had always thought he was too important to knock.

“They’re out back now, on the deck.”

“I’m pulling into the drive now,” I said.

As I drove down our lane, past the Langley house and the cop car still posted there, I noticed a couple of people proceeding, very slowly and with their heads down, across the backyard of the Langley house, heading toward the wooded area that separated their house from ours. Forensic cops, I figured.

I drove my pickup past our back deck and parked out front of the shed next to Conrad’s Audi TT, one of the new redesigned ones. Conrad and Illeana were sitting on the deck, bottles of beer on the arms of their chairs. Ellen’s Mazda sedan was nowhere to be seen, which must have meant Derek was out. Too bad, because I had some new questions for him.

Conrad was on his feet and walking over to the truck as I got out, arm and hand extended, his other hand wrapped around the brown bottle. I didn’t have much choice but to take it. He had a grip that was stronger than it needed to be, like he was out to prove something. He was already a big guy-250 pounds I was betting-and a good six feet tall. Full of swagger and confidence. I wondered if, where I was concerned, he laid on the ol’ buddy routine a bit too hard. He knew he had wronged me in the past, and seemed desperate, even after all these years, to be able to show that we could be friends.

I wasn’t interested.

“Jim,” he said, smiling.

“Excuse the mess,” I said, holding up the grimy hand he’d already gripped, then gesturing to myself and my work clothes. “I had to go out this morning and finish up a yard or two.”

“Don’t apologize,” he said, then, tipping his head in the direction of the Langley place, said, “Can you believe it?”

I just shook my head, walking back to the house, Conrad keeping pace with me.

“And to be right next door,” Conrad said, lightly patting me a couple of times between the shoulder blades, demonstrating that you can fuck a guy’s wife and still be pals. “I can’t imagine what that must be like. And you didn’t hear anything?”

We’d already been through this on the phone. “No,” I said.

Conrad said, “I’d known Albert for years, you know. He was more than just my lawyer. He was a good friend. Known him since high school. He and Donna, they’d been to the house a number of times. Albert was on a couple of college committees over the years. Got involved in his community, a terrific guy, at least for someone who managed to get a lot of scumbags off over the years. But hey, that’s the job description.”

We’d reached the deck. Conrad’s wife, Illeana, in a white blouse and white shorts, blond hair cascading down to her shoulders, smiled as I mounted the steps, but didn’t get up. She extended a hand and I shook it lightly.

“Illeana,” I said.

“Hello, Jim,” she said. “Conrad felt we should come over.” As if she were apologizing, justifying their presence. “This is a tragedy for all of us.”

In the years since she’d moved here from Hollywood, Illeana had gotten the small-town-college-president’s-wife thing down pretty well. Expensive but tasteful clothes, heels that were high but not towering and no longer made of clear plastic, a blouse unbuttoned far enough to draw your eye in, but not enough to give you any real kind of a show. But under all that upstate New York respectability, there was still something of the tart about her. Like she was chewing invisible gum, making high-frequency snapping noises detectable only by the true hound dogs of my gender.