Linwood Barclay - Too Close to Home

“Letters,” I said.

“Pardon?” Burgess said.

“There were letters on the computer. To a teacher.”

Burgess took a breath. “Were they to me? What did they say?”

“I don’t know. You think they were to you?”

He ran his tongue over his lips nervously. “It’s possible. He wrote a few to me back then. They were. . he seemed a bit infatuated with me, if you want to know the truth.” He shook his head, trying to dismiss the whole thing. “I’m sure it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Trey worries about these sorts of things. It hardly matters now. It’s not like I have a job to lose anymore.” He licked his lips again. “If you should happen to run across them, would you let me know?”

“I’ll keep my eye out,” I said.

He thanked me and went back into the house. I went over to Drew, mentioned to him about the tomato plants, and we got started. I took the tractor, cut the front and back yards, while Drew tackled the tight areas with the mower.

When we were done and packing things away, I thought Walter Burgess might come back out again, even if to say nothing more than he was happy with the job, but the front door never opened. Drew and I got in the truck.

“What’s their story?” Drew asked as we pulled away from the curb.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I could tell they were a couple of pansies, and I don’t have anything against that.”

“Sure.”

“But they were really going at it in there.”

“Go on.”

“I’d stopped the trimmer for a few seconds, had to get some more line out of it, and you were far enough away on the Deere, in the backyard, I think, so you weren’t making that much of a racket, and the two of them were bickering away in there like all get-out.”

“Really,” I said, turning the A/C fan up a notch. “About what?”

“At first, it was just random shit, how the one, not the one who came out and said hello to us, but the other one, he was going on about the tomato plants and whether we’d been warned about them or not, and then they started getting into other shit, and then the one with the plants said, ‘Maybe you’d be happier with some of your boy toys instead of me.’ And something like ‘You can’t be too careful, these things can come back and bite you in the ass.’”

“He said that?”

“Yeah.”

“So what did Walter-the one who came out and saw us-what did Walter have to say about that?”

“He said the other guy was overreacting, then he told him to go fuck himself.”

I fiddled a little more with the A/C. “Everybody’s got a lot of shit on their plate,” I said.

“Yeah,” said Drew. “No kidding.”

WE WERE PULLING UP to our second property of the day when my cell rang. I wasn’t expecting to hear any news from Ellen this early, but you never knew. I flipped open the phone without looking to see who was calling.

“Hello?” I said.

“Has something else happened between you and Lance?” a man asked. It took me a second to realize the mayor was on the other end.

“What are you talking about, Randy?” I said.

“Look, you two guys, you need to cut this shit out,” the mayor shouted into the phone. “He came back to work late yesterday after he got his face stitched, said he was okay to drive, but then last night, he’s supposed to run me up to some fucking fund-raising thing at the hospital and he doesn’t show. And he hasn’t shown up this morning.”

“So why you calling me, Randy? You asking me to drop what I’m doing and drive you around today? I can pick you up in my truck, but you’ll have to ride in the back with the tractor.”

“Always a fucking comedian,” he said. “I just want to know if you know where he is. I’ve called his house, his cell, called a couple of other people who know him, nobody’s seen him.”

“Why would you think I’d know?”

“I wanted to know whether you’d had another run-in with him. If you punched his ticket, let me know and I can stop expecting him.”

“I didn’t punch his ticket, Randy,” I said.

“So you haven’t seen him? Not since you paid him a visit yesterday?”

“That’s right,” I said. Unless that had been him the night before, working with Mortie. But I didn’t think it was Lance then, and I didn’t think it was Lance now. Besides, those dots didn’t connect, did they? And if that dark-haired guy had been Lance, wouldn’t he have found some excuse to kick the shit out of me? Me, tied to a chair, unable to fight back? Lance wouldn’t have been able to resist a target like that any more than I would have, had the roles been reversed.

“This isn’t like Lance,” Mayor Finley said. “I mean, he’s an asshole, I know that, but he’s generally a reliable asshole.”

“I wish I could help you, Randy,” I said. “But I’ve got work to do.”

“Where are you?”

“What?”

“In your truck. Right now. Where are you?”

“I’m on the north side. On Bethune.”

“Shit, that’s not far from where Lance lives. Drop by his place, see if he’s there.”

“Randy, are you kidding me?”

“You know where he lives, right?”

I did. When we both worked for Finley, I’d occasionally pick him up or drop him off with the mayor’s Grand Marquis.

“Forget it, Randy. Send some other errand boy.”

“Now you listen up, Cutter. You waltzed into city hall yesterday and assaulted a municipal employee. And to the best of my knowledge, no one called the cops on you. Not me, not even Lance. So there’s a favor you owe me. On top of that, if that dumb fuck passed out last night because of some sort of delayed concussion or something, thanks to you, then-”

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll drop by his place. But if he’s there and blows my brains out, I’m gonna be pissed with you.”

“Thanks. Call me.”

The mayor hung up. More than two years since I’d left his employ, and it seemed as though I’d had more conversations with him the last week than I’d had working for him on a daily basis.

“What are we doing?” Drew asked.

“Making a stop along the way,” I said.

I turned right off Bethune onto Raven, climbed it to Mountainside, hung a left. Lance lived on the second floor of a two-story apartment, accessed by an outside stairwell. I pulled the truck and trailer up to the curb, noticed Lance’s Mustang in the alleyway.

“Hey,” I said to Drew, “that look anything like the car you saw that guy drive off in last night?”

He seemed surprised to be asked, then said, “No. It wasn’t like that. I told the cop. It was a Buick or something, a four-door.”

I’d forgotten. “Right,” I said. “I’ll be right back.” I got out, climbed the steps to the apartment door, banged on it.

I tried peering through the door’s window, but there was a curtain in the way. I banged again, then spotted a doorbell button and leaned on it. I wasn’t raising anyone.

I came back down the stairs, got out my cell, phoned Randy back.

“The car’s here, but he’s not answering,” I said.

“Did you try the door?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “I did not try the door. I’m not barging in there. Lance’d love that, me busting down the door to his place. He’s probably in there with a shotgun.”

“Jesus, Cutter, the way your mind works.”

“Randy, do you have any idea what the last twenty-four hours have been like for me?”

“No,” he said. “What? Something happen?”

I just shook my head. “I’ll tell you all about it sometime. After you lose your bid for Congress, have some time on your hands. Then-”

“Excuse me.”

There was a short Chinese man in a flowered shirt and shorts standing next to me. I said, “Huh?”