Harlan Coben - One False Move

Chance jumped on that one. «And I can put a bullet through your heart.»

Myron put his finger to his lips again. «Shhh.»

Chance was about to add something, but Arthur took the helm. «We had a deal,» he said. «I help keep Brenda Slaughter out of jail. You search for Anita Slaughter and keep my name out of the papers. But you insist on delving into peripheries. That’s a mistake. Your pointless digging will eventually draw my opponent’s attention and give him fresh fodder to use against me.»

He waited for Myron to say something. Myron didn’t.

«You leave me no choice,» Arthur continued. «I will tell you what you want to know. You will then see that it is irrelevant to the issues at hand. And then we will move on.»

Chance did not like that. «Arthur, you can’t be serious-»

«Sit up front, Chance.»

«But-»

Chance was sputtering now. «He could be working for Davison.»

Arthur shook his head. «He’s not.»

«But you can’t know-»

«If he was working for Davison, they’d have ten guys following up on this by now. And if he continues to dig into this, he will most certainly be noticed by Davison’s people.»

Chance looked at Myron. Myron winked.

«I don’t like it,» Chance said.

«Sit up front, Chance.»

Chance rose with as much dignity as he could muster, which was absolutely none, and skulked to the front of the bus.

Arthur turned to Myron. «It goes without saying that what I’m about to tell you is strictly confidential. If it’s repeated…» He decided not to finish the sentence. «Have you spoken to your father yet?»

«No.»

«It will help.»

«Help with what?»

But Arthur did not reply. He sat in silence and looked out the window. The bus stopped at a traffic light. A group of people waved at the bus. Arthur looked right through them.

«I loved my wife,» he began. «I want you to understand that. We met in college. I saw her walking across the commons one day and…» The light turned green. The bus started up again. «And nothing in my life was ever the same.» Arthur glanced at Myron and smiled. «Corny, isn’t it?»

Myron shrugged. «Sounds nice.»

«Oh, it was.» He tilted his head at a memory, and for a moment the politician was replaced with a real human being. «Elizabeth and I got married a week after graduation. We had a huge wedding at Bradford Farms. You should have seen it. Six hundred people. Our families were both thrilled, though that didn’t matter a hoot to us. We were in love. And we had the certainty of the young that nothing would ever change.»

He looked off again. The bus whirred. Someone flipped on a television and then muted the sound.

«The first blow came a year after we wed. Elizabeth learned that she could not have children. Some sort of weakness in her uterine walls. She could get pregnant, but she couldn’t carry past the first trimester. It’s strange when I think about it now. You see, from the beginning Elizabeth had what I thought of as quiet moments – bouts of melancholy, some might call them. But they didn’t seem like melancholy to me. They seemed more like moments of reflection. I found them oddly appealing. Does that make any sense to you?»

Myron nodded, but Arthur was still looking out the window.

«But now the bouts came more often. And they were deeper. Natural, I suppose. Who wouldn’t be sad under our circumstances? Today, of course, Elizabeth would have been labeled a manic depressive.» He smiled. «They say it’s all physiological. That there is simply a chemical imbalance in the brain or some such thing. Some even claim that outside stimuli are irrelevant, that even without the uterine problem Elizabeth would have been equally ill in the long run.» He looked at Myron. «Do you believe that?»

«I don’t know.»

He didn’t seem to hear. «I guess it’s possible. Mental illnesses are so strange. A physical problem we can understand. But when the mind works irrationally, well, by its very definition, the rational mind cannot truly relate. We can pity. But we cannot fully grasp. So I watched as her sanity began to peel away. She grew worse. Friends who had thought Elizabeth eccentric began to wonder. At times she got so bad that we would feign a vacation and keep her in the house. This went on for years. Slowly the woman I had fallen in love with was eaten away. Well before her death – five, six years before – she was already a different person. We tried our best, of course. We gave her the best medical care and propped her up and sent her back out. But nothing stopped the slide. Eventually Elizabeth could not go out at all.»

Silence.

«Did you institutionalize her?» Myron asked.

Arthur took a swig of his Snapple. His fingers started playing with the bottle’s label, pulling up the corners. «No,» he said at last. «My family urged me to have her committed. But I couldn’t do it. Elizabeth was no longer the woman I loved. I knew that. And maybe I could go on without her. But I could not abandon her. I still owed her that much, no matter what she’d become.»

Myron nodded, said nothing. The TV was off now, but a radio up front blasted an all-news station: you give them twenty-two minutes, they’ll give you the world. Sam read his People. Chance kept glancing over his shoulder, his eyes thin slits.

«I hired full-time nurses and kept Elizabeth at home. I continued to live my life while she continued to slide toward oblivion. In hindsight, of course, my family was right. I should have had her committed.»

The bus lurched to a stop. Myron and Arthur lurched a bit too.

«You can probably guess what happened next. Elizabeth grew worse. She was nearly catatonic by the end. Whatever evil had entered her brain now moved in and laid total claim. You were right, of course. Her fall was not accidental. Elizabeth jumped. It was not bad luck that she landed on her head. It was intentional on her part. My wife committed suicide.»

He put his hand to his face and leaned back. Myron watched him. It might be an acting job – politicians make awfully good thespians – but Myron thought that he spotted genuine guilt here, that something had indeed fled from this man’s eyes and left nothing in their wake. But you never know for sure. Those who claim they can spot a lie are usually just fooled with greater conviction.

«Anita Slaughter found her body?» Myron asked.

He nodded. «And the rest is classic Bradford. The cover-up began immediately. Bribes were made. You see, a suicide – a wife so crazy that a Bradford man had driven her to kill herself – would simply not do. We would have kept Anita’s name out of it too, but her name went over the radio dispatch. The media picked it up.»

That part certainly made sense. «You mentioned bribes.»

«Yes.»

«How much did Anita get?»

He closed his eyes. «Anita wouldn’t take any money.»

«What did she want?»

«Nothing. She wasn’t like that.»

«And you trusted her to keep quiet.»

Arthur nodded. «Yes,» he said. «I trusted her.»

«You never threatened her or-»

«Never.»

«I find that hard to believe.»

Arthur shrugged. «She stayed on for nine more months. That should tell you something.»

That same point again. Myron mulled it over a bit.

He heard a noise at the front of the bus. Chance had stood up. He stormed to the back and stood over them. Both men ignored him.

After several moments Chance said, «You told him?»

«Yes,» Arthur said.

Chance spun toward Myron. «If you breathe a word of this to anyone, I’ll kill-»

«Shhh.»

Then Myron saw it.

Hanging there. Just out of sight. The story was partially true – the best lies always are – but something was missing. He looked at Arthur. «You forgot one thing,» Myron said.