Ridley Pearson - The Art of Deception

“Where’s Ferrell fit in?”

“Top secret,” he teased, making light of it. He lied: “Walker’s a character witness in all this. We’ve got to make sure we got someone we can trust.”

“Ferrell’s okay.”

“Just okay? Maybe that’s not good enough.”

“In ballet … you ever been to ballet? … they say you’ve lost your point. The arch of the foot just can’t take it anymore and you lose your point, and you’re basically finished dancing.

After the accident … Mary-Ann’s dad, I’m talking about, not her … Ferrell lost his point. Lost me, too. Lost Mary-Ann to Neal. Within a year he’d lost everything else. Their daddy held those kids together. Fucked up the boat most all the time … the fishing … pissed them both off. Drank too much, sure. But he held them together. Him drowning like that. Probably should have seen it coming, but it fucked Ferrell up worse than Mary-Ann. Father, son, I suppose. Go figure.”

“Never heard that ‘point’ expression.” He hadn’t heard a great deal of this, but he didn’t want her necessarily knowing that.

“Yeah, you don’t strike me as the ballet type.”

“I’m adaptable,” he said, winning another smile from her.

“Why do I doubt that?”

“He says … Ferrell, this is … that Neal was pretty brutal on Mary-Ann. Put her in the emergency room a couple times.”

“I don’t know about that. The way she told it, that stuff happened out on the boat. Her and Ferrell out there trying to keep it going without their dad. I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”

“It wouldn’t be the first we’ve heard about Lanny Neal and his women,” he said.

“Listen, he’s no prince. Lanny has a wicked temper, no question about it. If Lanny was on meth … no, thank you. Makes him goddamn crazy, that stuff. He and Mary-Ann were practically married. Did I notice when she walked funny, or couldn’t use a bum arm? Sure I did. But I’m telling you, she said it happened out fishing, and I believed her. Not many girls work those boats, and those that do don’t do it for very long.”

“I’d take a Sam Adams if you had one.” He thought about those pills again, how easily they’d go down.

She drew him a draught beer. He paid with a five and left a couple bucks on the bar. He nursed the beer, not really in the mood to drink but wanting to be a paying customer. She said, “Let me get Stan to fill in behind the bar. I’ll catch up with you over in one of the booths.” The look she offered him took the darkness out of the dim room.

Ten minutes passed before she joined him. She brought him a fish and chips, telling him he looked like he could use it. She suggested vinegar on the fish, ketchup on the fries.

“Tell me about this accident,” LaMoia said.

“What’s to tell? Mr. Walker was a drunk. In this business,”

she said, glancing around the dark barroom, “you get so you can spot them, believe me. Growing up, I didn’t know it, but trust me, the guy was a fool for peppermint schnapps.” She shook like a wet dog to show her disdain. “The stuff makes me want to puke.”

“And he died how?”

“Fell overboard into his own net. Shit happens, what can I tell you?”

“And Ferrell gets the boat?”

“It damn near destroyed him, the old man’s death. Him and me … we were an item before that, but he pulled a Humpty Dumpty on me, and I had to bail just to keep my own head together.” She got a faraway look. “Tell you the truth, when I heard Mary-Ann had jumped, I believed it, except that she couldn’t drive over a bridge, much less jump from one. That family paid their dues. A lot was asked of her and Ferrell after their mom passed. The old man on the boat or in the bar wasn’t a damn bit of good to them. Them so young and all. I can see Ferrell flipping out over losing her, because they were this incredible team, the two of them. He flipped out, right? That’s what I’ve heard.”

LaMoia had read the newspaper articles on the case-all three of them. There’d been little mention of Walker beyond as surviving kin.

“Why do you say that?” he asked.

“That’s the word on the docks. Missed work. Got fired.

Hell … he’s been living on the streets for the better part of the winter. Living like a pig from what I hear. It’s a shame.”

“Do you have any idea where I might find him?”

“Is that what this is about?”

“It’s part of it,” he said, looking across at her.

“What’s the other part?” she asked.

“Did he ever bother you? Anything kinky-looking in your windows, that kind of thing?”

“Ferrell?”

He registered her astonishment.

“You think he ever followed Mary-Ann and Neal around?”

“That’s another story.”

“Tell me that story.”

“I’m just saying … yeah, he hassled Mary-Ann about seeing Lanny. Sure he did. What brother wouldn’t?”

“Hassled how?”

“Listen, he got down and out, right? Busted. Dead broke.

And he hit up Mary-Ann for money from time to time. I know that because she told me. And she helped him out when she could, sure she did. But he got to be a pain in the ass, coming around Lanny’s place at all hours, trying to get Mary-Ann back on the boat. But she just wasn’t cut out for it, you know? All those years she’d done it because if she didn’t her father would beat the crap out of her. Stupid drunk. First chance to blow it off, she took it, but it screwed Ferrell in the process, and he kept trying to get her to come back.”

“So he resented Neal?”

She leveled a look onto him that let him know what an un-derstatement that was. “Hello?”

A different picture of Walker was emerging, and LaMoia wasn’t entirely comfortable with it. He knew that Matthews needed to hear the bit about the father’s death and the repercus-sions on both his kids. Ferrell Walker had no doubt carried a lot of the weight of the family given the father’s alcoholism, and he’d cracked under the weight once the father was gone, which wasn’t the first time that story had been told. He thought the loss of the father was a button Matthews could push.

Cindy Martin fiddled with her hair, an awful color of yellow bought from a box.

LaMoia saw the change the discussion had brought on her.

“You all right?” LaMoia asked.

“Yeah … No. Not really. You think I messed him up, dump-ing him?”

“Sounds more like his family messed him up to me.”

“You don’t like the food?”

He’d picked at it but hadn’t eaten much. “Not that hungry is all. It’s good. Very good.” He stuffed a bite in. Too greasy.

She checked her watch. “My shift is over.”

“So it is.”

“You want to continue this someplace less smoky?”

“Where do you have in mind?” He met eyes with her. He was hitting on her, and he didn’t know why. He felt like an asshole. He didn’t have to sleep with her, he told himself. He didn’t have to fall into that pattern. Times like this he felt pro-grammed. He thought about the pills again. They were part of the program. They helped him relax, to be himself.

“I’ve got some pictures of Mary-Ann. That kind of thing. If they’d help?”

“The father?” He was thinking of a trigger for Matthews to use. He was thinking of that sweater lying on the floor, and this woman along with it.

“Might have. I’m not sure.”

“I’ve got wheels,” he said.

“I’m only a couple blocks,” she said.

He nodded, knowing he shouldn’t. Some habits were hard to break.

The wind drove the lines against the aluminum and steel down on the docks as LaMoia walked the three blocks with her. Twice he reached down into the coin pocket and touched the two capsules. He could dry-swallow them. A dozen thoughts churned inside him-images of a bloated old-man-Walker coming up with his net. The meds would slow down all thought, would kill the pain brought on by the wind.