Bill Pronzini - Snowbound

“What if somebody notices your car at the cabin or sees it drive up? The Markhams and the Donnellys live on the eastern shore of the lake.”

“Their homes are both well down the shore. It’ll be dark at the lake-no moon; the snowing will keep visibility down — and we’ll drive to and from the cabin with the headlights off. Somebody would have to be outside and peering along the road in order to see us, and that’s hardly likely. The only other occupied place at the lake is the cabin where those two San Francisco businessmen are staying, and it’s sheltered from the road by trees. As far as the car goes, I’ll park it in the Taggarts’ garage; the entrance is open and faces away from the road, and you can’t see into it from there.”

“Somebody could still notice you leaving the village or returning,” Peggy said. “They’d wonder about it.”

“If I’m ever asked, I’ll say I decided to go for a short drive, just to get some air, and stopped for a while and walked around. That’s why we’ll meet so early-for that reason, and because of my wife and your mother too. Nobody would question an explanation like that; why should they? It’ll look like I’m alone in the car anyway, since you’ll be scooted down on the seat. Peggy, I’m desperate to see you, and I’ll take the gamble if you will. We’ll be very careful; nothing can happen if we’re careful.”

There was a prolonged silence this time, and Hughes said her name questioningly. Peggy said then, “I really don’t think we ought to chance it, but I’m desperate to see you, too. And terribly horny. Are you terribly horny, Matt?”

Hughes had an erection again. “Yes!”

“Then-all right. You’ll pick me up at the fork at seven?”

“At seven. I don’t want to have to stop but a second, so hurry as fast as you can when you see the car.”

“I will.”

They said good-byes, and Hughes cradled the handset. He was sweating. He crossed to the lamp table beside his recliner, lifted his drink, drained it, and then looked at his watch: five forty-five. Leaving the study, he went upstairs and took a shower and doused himself liberally with body talc and changed into fresh clothes; came downstairs again and ate a light supper. The kitchen wall clock told him it was six forty when he had finished-time to leave. He would have to stop at the Mercantile to pick up the keys to the Taggart cabin.

Rebecca had still not come home, and he was relieved that she hadn’t. He did not want to face her now, with his thoughts and his emotions focused on Peggy Tyler’s lush sexuality. She would be home when he got back from the lake at nine or so, and he would tell her then of his contrived impotence. In just a few short hours, he thought as he hurried out of the house, everything would again be exactly as it had always been.

Compulsively, Cain put on his coat at six fifty and went out of the cabin and started down into the village.

He walked at a desultory pace, only superficially aware of the cold night and the snow-hazed lights below. His destination was the Valley Inn, and his purpose was to buy himself another bottle of bourbon-he kept telling himself that this was his purpose. There was an unopened quart in the cabin’s kitchen that he had purchased in the Mercantile that morning-enough to last him through the long Sunday ahead-but the desolation in him had become so acute the ache was almost physical.

The past two days had been interminable. After returning from the village Wednesday afternoon, where he had learned with indifference of the avalanche and the fact that the valley was snowbound until after Christmas, he had been completely exhausted. Sleep came immediately that night; but it had been restless and shallow, and he had awakened from it gritty-eyed and stiff-muscled and despondent. He’d thought again of Frank McNeil’s accusations, and the threat of arrest for something he had not done, and the imminent arrival of probing county police. All right then, he’d decided, let them come and let them ask their questions, and when the episode was concluded, he damned well would get out of this Hidden Valley where people persisted in pushing their way into his privacy; he would go somewhere else, he would find a place where the people would leave him utterly alone.

Then he’d thought: But was there such a place? Was there anywhere in the world where people would leave you utterly alone? Or would it always be as it had become here: intrusions, invasions, interference? And would. the loneliness, the ambivalence continue to plague him wherever he went? It had seemed so simple in the beginning: just go to a small mountain village where no one knew you and no one cared to know you, and live apart, and die by degrees. For six months he had managed to do that, but now it had all started to collapse; it was no longer simple at all.

And tonight, he was going to the inn to buy a bottle he did not need, because he might need it and because it was Saturday night and he was desperately lonely for companionship that he wanted but did not want.

When he reached Sierra Street, he crossed directly toward the inn. Two and a half stories high, and a full block wide, it was the largest building in Hidden Valley. It had a double-balconied, redwood-shingled facade designed to give the impression of comfortable rusticity-alight now with its Christmas decorations-and two separate entrances: one to the small lobby and one to the restaurant-and-lounge that constituted most of its interior at street level. The upper floors were divided into eleven rooms, including the large apartment in which the Hallidays lived.

Cain hesitated in front of the restaurant-and-lounge entrance. Light glowed behind a large frosted window, and there was the sound of soft music and muted conversation from within. Apprehension fluttered in his stomach, but he went woodenly to the door and opened it and stepped inside.

The interior had a low, beamed ceiling and was bisected by square redwood supports. Waist-high partitions, topped with planter boxes of wood ferns, had been erected between the posts. The restaurant area to the right was empty and dark, chairs stacked on tables, closed for the winter season. Only the lounge on the left side was open, dimly lit by two electrically wired wagonwheel chandeliers suspended from the rafters. Eight booths with high, varnished wood backs were set along the partitions; dark leather stools flanked a leather-fronted bar against the far left wall. The rear wall and part of that behind the bar were adorned with deer antlers and glass-eyed deer heads; a glass-fronted case containing two matching and ornate shotguns, replete with boxes of shells; fishing creels and rods and corkboard displays of colored trout flies. Some fifteen people occupied the lounge, most of those in the booths. Only one man-Joe Garvey-sat at the bar, at the upper end, talking with Walt Halliday.

Cain brushed snow from his coat and stamped it soft-footed from his boots. Then he walked slowly and directly to the bar, not looking at the people in the booths, and sat on the end stool staring straight ahead. A full minute passed before Halliday came down to him.

“Can I get a bottle off-sale?” Cain asked him.

A frown creased Halliday’s plump face; he hesitated. “We don’t usually sell off-sale,” he said finally.

“I’ll pay extra for it.”

“No need for that. Okay-what brand?”

“Old Grandad.”

“Set you up a drink too?”

“No, I don’t… yes. Grandad straight up.”

“Chaser of some kind?”

“Nothing, just the shot.”

Halliday hesitated again, as if he wanted to say something further. Then he shrugged and poured the drink and set the shot glass in front of Cain, took a full bottle from the backbar display, put that down, made change from the twenty Cain slid across the polished surface, and went back to the other end of the plank. When Cain lifted the glass, he was peripherally conscious of Halliday and Garvey looking at him and talking in low voices. He turned slightly on his stool, so that he could see nothing but the rimed front window, and tasted his bourbon. It burned in his mouth, his throat, the hollow of his belly. He put the glass down again and lit a cigarette.