Linwood Barclay - Far From True

“Two days,” Miriam said.

“Where?”

“Lenox.” A small town, just into Massachusetts, where they held the annual Tanglewood music festival. “There’s an inn there I go to when I need some time.”

“Time for what?”

“I don’t know who you are, or why you’re here, but I’m not answering another question until you tell me where Adam is. Is he okay? Has he had a heart attack?”

You did what you had to do.

“Have a seat,” I told her.

“No.”

“Please. Let’s go into the kitchen.”

She knew it was going to be bad. I could see it in her face. I pulled out a chair at the table for her, sat down close to her on the corner. My eyes were glancing around, wondering where the alcohol was kept.

“There was an accident last night,” I said. “At the Constellation Drive-in. You know it?”

Miriam nodded.

“The screen toppled. It looks like it was a bomb. The screen fell on some cars, crushed them, including a Jag registered to your husband. He was in the car. The police got in touch with Lucy, told him that her father was dead.”

“No,” she whispered. “There must be a mistake. Why wasn’t I called? Why’s no one been in touch with me?”

“That might be because everyone thought you had died with your husband.”

She let that sink in for a moment.

“There was someone else in the car,” she said. It wasn’t a question. “Of course. Who goes to the drive-in alone?” She fixed her eyes on me. “Who was it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know if anyone knows at this point. I don’t know if anyone realizes the mistake that’s been made. Because you’ve been out of town, because you haven’t been here.”

“All Lucy had to do was look in the garage and see my car wasn’t here and... the stupid twat. Where is Adam? Where is he... where are they keeping him?”

“You should talk to Lucy. Or the coroner’s office. He may have been moved to a funeral home. Paisley and Wraith, for example. They’re the biggest in town.”

Miriam sniffed.

“There are probably people you should call,” I said. “Your brother, for one. Lucy was in touch with him. I think he’s coming here, with the intention of identifying your remains.”

“Good God.”

“Why were you in Lenox?” I asked.

“I needed some time to think. Adam and I have been... having a rough patch. I wanted to be alone with my thoughts. Even if someone had tried to reach me, I had my phone off most of the time. I didn’t watch the news, didn’t know anything about any of this. Today, I was ready to talk, but I couldn’t get hold of him.”

“You left a message. That you didn’t think you could keep on going this way.”

The tears were coming now. She tried to wipe them away from her cheeks with her fingers. “Purse,” she whispered.

I retrieved it from the front hall, set it on the table, and sat back down. She reached in for some tissue, dabbed her eyes, then went back in and brought out a pack of Winstons and a lighter. She got a cigarette between her fingers, but her hand was shaking too much to light it. I gently took the lighter from her, held it to the end of the cigarette.

She pulled hard on it, held the smoke in her lungs, let it come out her nostrils.

“I think I know who it was,” she said quietly.

“In the car? The woman?”

Miriam’s head went up and down a quarter inch. “Felicia.” Maybe thinking I was going to ask, she added, “His slut of an ex-wife. They kept in touch.”

“No,” I said. “I saw her this morning.”

Miriam’s damp eyes darted about, as though the answer were hidden here in the kitchen. “Then Georgina.”

“Georgina?”

“Blackmore. Georgina Blackmore. Her husband’s a professor at Thackeray. English something or other.”

Another connection between her husband and the college. First Clive Duncomb, now a Professor Blackmore.

“That little bitch,” she said.

“Is the professor a friend of the head of security out there?” I asked. “Clive Duncomb.”

Her eyes flashed for a second, then appraised me in a way they hadn’t up until now.

“Why would you ask about him?”

“You and your husband have entertained him and his wife, here, for dinner. You’re friends.”

Miriam Chalmers eyed me with the same level of suspicion she’d displayed when first finding me in the house.

“Why, exactly, are you here, in my house? You’re not with the police.”

“No, I’m not. I’m private.”

“You’re here at Lucy’s direction?”

“Someone was in the house,” I said, nodding. “Since news broke of the disaster, and it became known your husband was among the victims, someone got in. To get something.” I paused. “From the room downstairs.”

It was as though she’d been Tasered.

“What?”

She pushed back her chair so quickly ashes fell from the end of the Winston and landed on her dress. She got up, taking the cigarette from her mouth and clutching it in her fingers, and headed straight for the stairs.

I followed.

She’d only descended three steps when she caught sight of the bookcase out of its usual position, the secret room exposed.

“Oh my God,” she said. “No, no, no.”

She entered the room, saw the scattered DVD cases on the floor.

“This isn’t happening,” she said.

Miriam spun around, pointed at me. “Where are they? What did you do with those? What is it you want? Is it money? Is that what you want?”

“I don’t have them. But I’m guessing you might know who would.”

Miriam was trying to take it all in.

“Get out,” she said. “Get the fuck out of my house and tell Lucy I can solve my own goddamn problems.”

When Trevor Duckworth dropped off the Finley Springs Water truck at the end of his shift, he went around to the office to see if the boss was in.

He wasn’t.

“Do you have a number for him?” he asked one of the women in the office. A cell phone number was provided. He entered it straight into his own phone’s contacts list.

But he didn’t call Randall Finley right away. He had to think about whether this was the right thing to do.

It galled him that his father had been right. His dad had said the only reason Finley had hired him was that his father was a detective with the Promise Falls police. Finley wanted Barry Duckworth to feed him things, things about the department, that might help Finley when he went after the mayor’s job.

Trevor’s dad had said no when Finley asked him directly. But now Finley was coming at it another way. He’d had a chat with Trevor a couple of weeks ago, let him know that he was friends with the family of Trevor’s former girlfriend, Trish Vandenburg.

Finley described himself as Trish’s unofficial uncle. She’d told him things. She’d told him about the time Trevor had hit her in the face.

It was an accident.

Didn’t seem like it to Trish, Finley told him. She’d spent three days in her apartment waiting for the bruise to fade before she went outside. Trevor tried to explain that he’d thought Trish was going to slap him, so he’d brought up his hand to stop her, but ended up backhanding her.

However it might have happened, Finley said, it happened. But the onetime mayor made clear to Trevor that he had done him a favor. Trish had been wondering about whether to report the assault to the police, but Finley had persuaded her it was a bad idea.

But who knew? Finley said. She might change her mind one day. Trevor’s boss wanted the young man to know he’d keep his mistake under wraps as best he could, so long as Trevor was open to the idea of proving his gratitude.