Peter Straub - If You Could See Me Now

“What is? That gascan’s from my home.”

“Sure it is. He snuck out, stole that can of gas, came back here, spilled it around and set it alight. He might as well have confessed. He couldn’t take it any more.”

“No, no, no,” I said, “Polar Bears, he was at my place earlier. He was trying to escape before that gang of thugs beat him up or killed him. He wasn’t guilty, he didn’t have anything to confess.”

“Give it up, Miles,” Hovre said. “You already told me you hadn’t seen him. It’s too late to lie about it.”

“I’m not lying now.”

“You were before, but you’re not now.” His voice was toneless and disbelieving.

“He left my house a little after three. Somebody must have been following him all the time. Somebody killed him. That’s what he was afraid of. That’s why he ran. I even heard the car.” My voice was rising.

Polar Bears scuffled a few paces away. I saw that he was struggling to keep himself under control. “Now, Miles,” he said, turning around to face me again, “it seems to me, just to get back to reality here, that the coroner might go one of two ways on this one. You listening? He might judge this as suicide or accidental death in the commission of a crime, depending on how much he wanted to protect the reputation of Paul Kant. Either way he’s got to weigh in the evidence of that gascan.”

“Those are the only two verdicts you think he might consider?”

“Yep.”

“Not if I can help it.”

“You won’t be able to do anything here, Miles. You better finish off that research of yours and get out.”

“Who’s the coroner here?”

Polar Bears gave me a flat angry triumphant glare. “I am.”

I could only stare at him.

“In a county of this size, it didn’t make much sense to have two men both drawing public salaries.”

I turned wordlessly to look at the fire. It was much lower now and the doorframe and all of the roof had collapsed into the roaring heart of the building. My skin felt half-roasted, face and hands. My trousers were hot where they brushed my legs. I sensed the Kastads shying away from both me and the fire.

“He was at my house,” I said. I could not bear it any longer. I started to walk towards him. “He was at my house, and you raped my cousin. You and Duane. You killed her. Probably accidentally. But this makes two deaths you want to shovel dirt over. This time it won’t happen.”

His fury was more frightening than Duane’s because it was quieter. “Dave,” he said, looking over my shoulder.

“You can’t pin it all on an innocent man because he’s conveniently dead,” I said. “I know who it is.”

“Dave.” Lokken came up behind me. I could hear him walking over the gravel.

“It’s that boy Zack,” I said. “There’s one other possibility, but it’s too crazy… so it has to be Zack.” I heard Lokken whisper something in surprise behind me. “He had those Coke bottles in his truck, and a doorknob…”

“Do you know who Zachary is, Miles?” interrupted Polar Bears, his voice flat as a tombstone.

“He likes fires too, doesn’t he?” I said. “Duane said he liked them so much sometimes he didn’t wait for someone else to start them.”

Dave Lokken grabbed my arms. “Hold him, Dave,” said Polar Bears. “Hold him good.” He came up close to me, and Lokken pinned my arms back, holding me so tightly I could not move. “You know who Zachary is?”

“Now I do,” I tried to say.

“He’s my boy,” said Polar Bears. “My son. Now I’m going to teach you when to shut up.”

In the second before he hit me I saw his face irradiated with rage and I had time to wonder if Duane would have told me the final detail if he had not cut his hand. Then I couldn’t think about anything but the pain. Afterwards he told Lokken to let me fall, and I toppled over onto the gravel. I could not breathe. I heard him say, “Lokken, get your fat ass out of here fast,” and I opened my eyes and saw his shoes. One of his toecaps lifted and came down on my face. I could hear Lokken running off. Polar Bears’ odor poured over me. The foot lifted from my face. his voice came straight into my ear. “You would have been a lot better off if you hadn’t never come here, Miles. And I think you better act like you know it.” I could hear him breathing hard. Wild Turkey mingled with the smell of gunpowder. “Miles, goddamn you, if you say one more word about those goddamned Coke bottles or goddamned doorknobs I’ll break you in half.” his breathing became ragged and harsh, and his belly strained out against his belt with the force of it. “And your cousin died twenty years ago, Miles. You say one more word about her and you’re through. Now remember this and remember it good. Whoever it was that was there when your cousin died saved your life by dragging you up onto the shelf. Maybe they wouldn’t repeat the favor. Maybe they’d just drop you back in the water.” Then he grunted, standing up, and was gone. I closed my eyes. I could hear tires spraying gravel.

When I opened my eyes again I touched my face. I felt slick blood. Then I sat up. I was alone. Duane’s Dream House was only a burning jumble of boards emitting a plume of dark smoke. Paul’s body was gone, and so was the heap of blankets. I was absolutely alone, lying on the white gravel beside a dying fire.

The final stage began.

When I reached home, I washed the blood from my face and went upstairs to bed and stayed there thirty-six hours. I was without friends — Paul was dead, Duane hated me, and Polar Bears had revealed himself as an enemy too complex to see clearly. I felt his touch burning me like a branding iron, and that touch was worse than his blows. My only protection was Rinn, a woman more than ninety years old. Yet if Polar Bears and Arden in general had absolved me of suspicion, why did I need protection? From Zack? I had done my worst there. I rolled under the damp sheets, groaning. I felt great dread.

I know that I waited, hearing nothing but the sound of my own voice saying to Polar Bears over the body of Paul Kant that there was another possibility, but it was too crazy, and knowing that it was there that my real dread originated… and lay rigid with tension. But nothing happened. There is no other possibility, I told myself. Gradually I calmed, eventually I went back to sleep.

I woke, aware of the smell of cold water inundating the room. “Alison,” I said.

A hand touched my shoulder. This happened. I rolled over and reached out and touched — I touched the body of a girl. A slight cold body, much colder than my hands. I was in that condition of only partial wakefulness when reality is at its most tenuous. I was conscious only of having been forgiven, and of her presence. My hands went, on their own impulse, to her face and felt what I could not see, the taut cheekbones bracketing that wild contradictory magical face, then her smooth hair. I felt her smile loosing itself under my palm, and there was no doubt that it was the smile of Alison Greening. A great general feeling of blessedness suffused my entire body. I touched her slim legs, embraced her lithe waist, cradled my head in the dip of flesh at the base of her neck. I have never felt such joy.

Actually, I have felt precisely that joy, and for the same reason: during the years of our marriage, I would at times come groggily half-awake and brush against Joan and think Alison , and embrace her, feeling in her longer taller body as we made love the lineaments of the dead girl I needed. At such moments, I experienced the same numb ecstasy, the same blessing; but on this night, the sensations were even more particularized, and as I embraced her shoulders and entered her, the small hands on my back and the slender body beneath mine were undoubtedly Alison’s. Everything else vanished, all the wretchedness of the past week. If we had been on a battlefield I would not have noticed the gunfire and exploding shells.