Richard Greener - The Knowland Retribution

Someone was indeed staring at him. At the far end of the bar he saw Isobel Gitlin looking right at him. A sense of shock rolled over him. He was riveted to the ground, undone by the dread he felt that his carefully constructed cocoon of privacy and safety had been pierced. Did she recognize him? How could she recognize him? She was blindfolded all the time. She hadn’t seen him, or had she? Then, next to her, he saw Walter Sherman. He was drinking from a bottle that appeared to be a Coke. Of course, Leonard realized with a comforting sense of relief, she had his description from him. There could be no other way. Unlike Isobel, Walter had not yet noticed him. Leonard chuckled. He tapped Roosevelt gently on the shoulder and told him to bring the rental car here, to Billy’s.

“I’m sorry. I can’t do that, sir,” said Roosevelt, confused and a little worried he’d somehow offended a customer, perhaps by stopping to talk with his grandfather. “There’s the paperwork, and I have to-”

“It’s okay, boy,” said Ike, not missing the stare that now both Walter and Isobel were giving to this bearded cowboy. “He ain’t no bushwhacker.” Leonard acknowledged the old man with a pleasant tip of his hat and moved slowly but easily toward the far end of the bar where Walter and Isobel sat motionless. Billy saw the connection too. His old friend Walter and his new friend Isobel looked right at this guy with the floppy, western hat. The surprise on their faces was unmistakable. They knew him, Billy figured, but were they happy to see him? He couldn’t tell. The cowboy seemed eager enough to see them. His gait as well as his smile was definitely friendly. Billy had reached for the baseball bat he kept behind the bar. It had been so long since he grabbed a bat, or anything like that, with bad intentions. He broke a sweat, but as Leonard passed him, he realized it was uncalled for. He dropped the wooden club and, shaken, wiped his face with a bar towel. Walter had not missed Billy’s clenched teeth or his hands beneath the bar. Even the sight of Leonard Martin could not overcome the nagging question in Walter’s mind: Who was this William Mantkowski?

“Ms. Gitlin, a pleasure to see you-again,” Leonard said, holding his hand out. She shook it and it seemed she was trying to say something, but nothing came out. “Mister Sherman.” Again, he tipped his hat politely.

Walter said, “Please call me Walter. And what should I call you?”

“Leonard will do just fine. I hope my deception can be forgiven between us.”

“You look just like Walter said you would.”

“Ms. Gitlin-”

“Isobel.”

“Isobel, you’re nervous. You know what I look like, so why haven’t you printed it?”

“We can’t. The New York Times won’t print something we can’t confirm to be true.”

“Of course not,” Leonard said. Even Walter caught that one.

“That’s not a joke.” Isobel was unnerved. Despite her education and experience, she believed in the integrity of the press in general and the New York Times in particular. Plus, Walter told her that Leonard Martin was coming tomorrow afternoon. Not now. Seeing him, like this, without even the semblance of a blindfold-she needed to collect herself. “Just because Walter told me what he saw doesn’t mean I can print it. I didn’t see it.”

“No, I suppose you didn’t and you can’t. And you couldn’t say that Walter Sherman saw me without explaining who Walter Sherman is. That I suspect would be just as difficult. So difficult that it will never happen.”

Isobel said, “Yes. That will never happen.”

A moment of awkward silence followed. Isobel had yet to fully digest what was going on, yet at the same time, she understood Walter actually encouraged moments like these. That whole character revelation thing, she remembered. Walter tried to gauge Leonard’s state of mind. He seemed unfazed by the absence of conversation. Walter noticed he hadn’t changed his clothes for a while. His boots were soiled and Leonard Martin gave off a scent Walter immediately recognized as country, rural, backwoods. No airplane ride was sufficient to hide this. This guy hadn’t gone back to New Mexico, had he?

Leonard asked Isobel, “You haven’t spoken to anybody today, have you?”

Isobel said, “No. I mean, who do y-you mean?”

“Check your messages. You have a call to return.”

“This is not a good place to talk,” Walter said. “Why don’t we go to my house.”

“I’m expecting a car here.”

“You won’t need one. Really, you won’t. If you need to go somewhere afterward, I can have you driven, wherever. Or, if you haven’t made arrangements, I have room. You can stay at my place.”

“Thank you,” Leonard said. “That’s very considerate, but I wouldn’t want to put you to any trouble.”

“No trouble at all,” said Walter. “Are you ready to go?”

Walter looked to Isobel. She answered his question with obvious uncertainty. “Sure,” she said. “I’m ready to go.” Walter left some money on the bar and the three of them walked out. As they passed Ike, Leonard stopped and said, “Please tell your grandson I won’t need that car after all. And give him this for any trouble I’ve caused.”

“That’s not called for,” said Ike, refusing the money, “but I’ll let him know.”

When they were gone, Billy yelled to Ike, “What the hell was that all about?”

“Don’t know,” Ike said, puffing like a locomotive running full steam ahead uphill. “Don’t know. But I seen that guy somewhere, I think-don’t remember, exactly. But something about him. I seen him, I think.”

Unlike Tom Maloney, Leonard Martin did not seem to notice the beauty of St. John or the darkening sea below and beyond the mountain road. The setting sun, the clouds floating over St. Thomas, the sailboats leaving their sunlit silver wakes-they held no interest for him. He was oblivious to the condition of the roads and didn’t bother to look when they passed a herd of noisy goats struggling to climb one of the hills. He sat in the back seat, alone and quiet. Walter thought he might have dozed off. He looked in the rearview mirror. Leonard had the brim of his hat pulled down, covering most of his face. Perhaps his eyes were closed. “If I had a gun,” thought Walter, “I could kill him right here.”

Even a man who’s lost his sense of natural beauty could not resist the view from the patio of Walter’s house. Leonard Martin was no exception. He stood, pressed against the railing, overlooking the steep mountainside and the sea. Walter seriously wondered what such a man could be thinking. He could make no guesses. Finally, Leonard turned to the covered table where both Walter and Isobel sat, took a chair, and accepted a glass of lemonade from Clara.

“This morning,” Leonard began.

“I know,” said Walter. “We know. We saw it on CNN earlier this afternoon.”

“I hope that doesn’t make this too uncomfortable.”

“This whole thing is a little creepy, is it not?” said Isobel.

“It is a bit. I don’t know,” said Walter. “A black man shot to death in Mississippi on Martin Luther King’s birthday.” A statement or a question-Walter’s words hung in the humid air.

“Judged by the content of his character,” Leonard said.

Walter went on. “That you could kill a man in Mississippi in the morning and by evening be a thousand miles away, on a tiny island, sitting in the very same chair he once sat in.” Leonard Martin showed no reaction. “What would you call that?” Walter asked.

“Serendipity?” said Leonard. “I can change seats, if you want.”

Isobel’s curiosity was near the bursting point. She said nothing, but inside her head she was screaming, “My God! What are we doing here?” Leonard tried to look completely at ease, but Isobel saw the movement of his upper lip, the increased respiration, and the occasional darting of his eyes. Walter had taught her well. His hat was off and the close cut of his hair no longer obscured his features. Looking closely-real closely-you could see it was him. From the corner of one eye she saw Walter, as calm as if he had been relaxing on the beach. His gaze was fixed on the other man, the one who used to be fat and blonde, the one who used to be a successful real estate lawyer, the one who used to be a husband and a father and a grandfather, the one who was now a killer.