John Gardner - Stillness & Shadows

Incredibly, Craine had his pistol out and was pointing it at Royce’s head.

He could not remember, later, getting back to the office. He remembered standing there, heart beating wildly, in the Denhams’ store, then sitting, at Mrs. Denham’s insistence — she came to him with a chair, telling him, “Sit down now, just sit down, Mr. Craine”—and Meakins taking over, face patchy red, loose skin trembling, more upset than Craine had ever seen him before, an anguished mother, woebegone fat widow, and Royce meek as a lamb in the corner, like a middle-class citizen arrested for indecent exposure — a terrible momentary ruin of himself, humanity stripped naked of its jokes. — All this, of course, Craine thought only later. At the time he thought nothing, merely sat patting himself, one pocket, then another, like a lunatic seeing if he was there. Hannah ran in, ran out, ran in, talking with the Denhams, with Royce, with the girl. “You just cry, honey. Do you good. I be with you in a minute.”

Then, somehow, they were back at the agency, and Craine had his overcoat and suit coat off. Like a man with a concussion, he kept looking around, trying to find the Bible.

“Craine,” Hannah said, “I’m ’onna tell you somethin. You’re lucky as hell and don’t forget it!” She seated him at his desk and poured whiskey in his glass. She was so angry she was wheezing and blowing; he’d never seen her so angry. She was sweating, sour as a raccoon. “Crazy Royce, he don’t know you was fixing to shoot him dead, least he don’t know for sure, since he’s all the time clowning with that pistol of his, so maybe you was too. That’s one reason you lucky.” She struck the air with a raised index finger, like a great black female judge.

He was having trouble with his glass, his hands so wobbly he couldn’t lift it. She scrutinized him, heavy lips pursed, then reached over, squinting, put one hand around his two, and helped him bring the whiskey to his mouth. He took a gulp and she helped him set it down again.

“And as far as a outsider would be able to say, it’s the girl was in the wrong, what with the beard and all. That’s reason number two .” She struck the air with two fingers. She could see, he knew, that he was hoping she’d help him again, but she drew back her hand, with a blistering look, closed the hand to a plump, tight first, and buttressed her hip with it. She tilted her head, chin lifted. In the next room Meakins was talking softly to the girl. Royce wasn’t there. “Get outta here,” Hannah had said when she’d finally gotten to Royce. “Emmit, go take a vacation.” The sun was overhead now, no shadows in the parking lot. “And reason number three is”—she shook three fingers—“the Denhams never called the police, thanks to me and Tom Meakins.”

The experience was not an unusual one for Craine; detectives develop a kind of sense. He opened his eyes slowly, squinting at the gray metal dashboard for an instant before he rolled his eyes left, toward daylight and the sidewalk opposite, and saw her. She saw him the same second, and it was as if someone had struck her on the head from behind. She stood spraddle-legged, face thrown forward, mouth open, immobilized by panic — or so it seemed to Craine — too terrified to scream. Behind her, on the shaggy lawn bright with autumn leaves and long-shadowed sunlight, three students, two boys and a girl, were throwing a Day-Glo orange Frisbee. Craine winced, though he was hardly hung over at all this morning. He had an odd sensation in his ears, as if his mind were uncrinkling; otherwise he was fine. Carefully, he opened his eyes again. The day was clear and plain, not a hint of a shadow or apparition. Half a block away a small group of students in jeans and long hair moved, talking and laughing, toward the campus. Farther away other groups drifted in the same direction. It was eight, perhaps nine, o’clock. Craine had no time for a glance at his watch.

Hurriedly he rolled down the window and leaned his head out. The weather surprised him, gone suddenly warm. It would bring rain. “Everything all right, Miss Glass?” he called. He heard an unintended hint of nastiness in his tone. With a touch of surprise, as if he hadn’t listened to his own voice in years, he recognized the tone as habitual. The girl said nothing, staring as she’d have stared at a scorpion. He called again, more gently, he hoped, though he too was in a panic, one hand fumbling for the whiskey in the seat to the right of him, making sure the bottle was still upside up. “Everything all right?”

She bobbed her head up and down, turned to crane her head in the direction of the university as if for rescue, then jerked it back, looking at him again.

“Off to class?” he called. He got his pipe out, fumblingly, stuck it between his teeth and patted his pockets for matches. Partly the pipe was meant to put her at ease; partly he needed it because at the notch of his collarbone his heartbeat was a white-hot pain. He had no idea what Hannah and Meakins had told her. He was betting they’d put the whole burden on Ms. Glass, protecting the agency; betting they’d telephoned her parents and made them squirm. Again she was bobbing her head, this time with a panicky smile. Her long-fingered hands were moving, beside the pockets of her coat. It was camel’s hair. She had knee socks — heavy, like a soccer player’s — and shoes like a Puritan’s, with large, square buckles. On her head she had a navy blue beret. He understood more now, seeing her dressed in her normal attire. Her mother was pretty, probably dyed her hair slightly red, probably had gold tiles leading down the hallway to the bathroom. Her father was timid and intellectual, tendency to snap. Not a handsome man. She took after her father. Craine called out, “You forgot your books.”

“I have to get breakfast first,” she called back, then looked frightened again, knowing what was coming.

“Hop in then. I’ll treat you.” Craine grinned.

It seemed certain she would flee, but after a moment’s hesitation — to Craine’s mild astonishment — she looked left and right, head thrown forward myopically, checking for traffic, then came hurrying across the street and, watching him to see that he didn’t run over her, edged around the front of the truck. He leaned over, reaching past the whiskey, and pushed open the door. She poked her head in, wide-eyed. Her mouth was large and full and as plain as a bagel.

“You don’t know what it’s like,” she said — speaking in a burst above the restaurant noise, shoveling her egg in, chewing with her mouth open, sometimes jerking back from her plate, stopping suddenly, eyebrows jerking upward, eyes slightly bulging, her long hand poking at her breakfast with her fork as if she thought for a moment she’d discovered a hair in it — possibly a spider — but finding nothing and popping the bite into her mouth, chewing again very carefully with her mouth open, eyes cast over toward the corner of the restaurant as if analyzing the texture of the egg for the hair she’d missed. “Boy! You don’t know! They come driving from Chicago — my parents never fly — my mother loves flying but my father’s scared shitless, so everywhere they go they take the car or the train. So they come driving from Chicago and we all go to the Gardens, it’s the only restaurant in Gourmet magazine — they do everything in style, if you know what I mean, and they tell you about it — you know what I mean?”

Craine nodded, carefully spreading jelly on his toast. The restaurant was crowded — students, telephone men, bakery-truck drivers with yellow writing on their coats. Craine had to lean in to hear. The brick and glass walls sent back a primal roar, the deep pythonic rumble of silverware and talk, and in the kitchen and at the pass-through, plates slammed, bacon hissed, busboys and waitresses cried out sharply to the two black cooks.