Bill Pronzini - With an Extreme Burning

There wouldn't be anything in the common rooms, the ones Jerry let visitors into. His bedroom, then. And the spare bedroom that he'd mentioned having turned into a home office. The third possibility was the garage. Dix crossed to the center hall, switched off the living room light, and put on the hall light. The door to Jerry's bedroom was open. He went in, fumbled around until he located the wall switch.

The room was almost monastic. Standard double bed, nightstand, dresser; no photographs, no pictures or wall coverings of any kind. All neat, dusted and vacuumed, the bed made and the coverlet smoothed out to a military tautness: Jerry was as fastidious about his surroundings as he was about his personal appearance. Dix opened the nightstand and dresser drawers, found nothing to hold his attention, and moved to the closet. It was deep and wide, not quite a walk-in closet. Clothing carefully arranged on hangers, half a dozen pairs of shoes on a shoe tree, a few small storage boxes. And on one of the shelves, in a back corner—

A trophy.

Thin-lipped, Dix dragged it off the shelf. Tennis trophy, figure of a player—a woman player—mounted on top. Heavy wood and brass, not pot metal like most trophies of the type. The brass plate on the front bore an etched inscription: Cheryl Adams. Singles Champion. Oregon Coast Invitational Tournament. Pelican Bay, 1979 .

Dix stood holding the trophy. Jerry had kept it because it had probably belonged to his wife: Cheryl Adams, her maiden name, won before their marriage. A memento tucked away in his closet, where nobody was likely to see it. Nobody but Katy. Most of their assignations had been at La Quinta Inn or up on Lone Mountain Road, but at least once he'd made the mistake of going to bed with her here. Katy had been snoopy; while he was in the can or elsewhere, she'd poked around in the closet and found the trophy. Asked him about it then or later—probably later. What did he have to do with Pelican Bay, when he supposedly came from Washington State? Who was Cheryl Adams? That was why he'd killed her when he had. Only she'd already said something to Eileen. Something oblique, but the fact that she'd mentioned it at all meant that she'd been worried about the possible connection. But not worried enough to keep from meeting Jerry on Lone Mountain Road on the night of August 6. Not worried enough to save her life.

He was gripping the trophy so hard, its edge cut painfully into the pads of his fingers. He relaxed his grip, put the thing back on the shelf, and turned to the storage boxes. Nothing in any of them but sweaters and other winter clothing. He got down on his hands and knees and looked under the bed. Not even dust.

The spare bedroom/office was across the hall. Small desk, Apple pc, chair, catchall table, not much else. On the desk, spread partway open, was a map. Dix picked it up. Topographical map of Mendocino County. The open part was of the coastline; and the intersection of Highway One and Stoneboro Road, a secondary road that led to the southern end of Manchester State Beach, had been circled by a red felt-tip pen. A series of red dashes had been drawn along Highway One from the intersection, as far north as a short distance beyond the hamlet of Manchester, and as far south as Point Arena. Two sets of inked numbers in Jerry's precise handwriting were bracketed next to the dashes: 0.3 and 1.1 on the north, 2.3 and 4.7 on the south. Mileage, evidently. One set could be the distances from the intersection to Manchester and Point Arena. But what did the other set indicate?

Manchester State Beach. Wasn't that where Cecca and Chet Bracco had had their summer cottage? Yes, sure—the Dunes. He and Katy had gone there with them one weekend seven or eight years before. Chet had gotten the cottage as part of their divorce settlement; he remembered Cecca telling him that. Did he still own it? Probably. Chet never let go of anything unless he was forced to.

What the hell could Jerry have been planning for the Dunes? Nothing involving Cecca; she couldn't be manipulated into going there, not the way she felt about Chet and anything they'd once shared. Nothing to do with Dix Mallory. Chet? Did Jerry's mania extend to an ex-husband Cecca had been in the process of divorcing when the accident happened in Pelican Bay? Possible. Amy? More likely. Lure her to the cottage, blow it up the way he'd blown up the Harrells' cabin?

Dix rummaged quickly through the desk. Nothing else that concerned Mendocino County or Manchester State Beach, and nothing pertaining to the Dunes. But he did find one thing in a drawer: a small, round piece of electronic equipment that would fit over the mouthpiece of a telephone, that had a mouthpiece of its own and a control gizmo on one side. The phone filter Jerry had used to disguise his voice. Dix left it where it was without touching it. Not conclusive evidence in its own right, but evidence just the same.

He opened the door to the office closet. Two heavy coats on hangers, some pc discs and other supplies on the shelves, and on the floor, a pile of blankets. He started to shut the door, paused, and looked again at the blankets! Why would they be on the floor like that, as neat as Jerry was? He knelt, tugged at them. And uncovered what was hidden underneath.

Two small oil paintings.

Katy's paintings, the ones Louise Kanvitz had sold for a thousand dollars apiece.

More evidence. Hard evidence.

He didn't touch the paintings either; recovered them with the blankets. Straightening, he checked his watch. Ten-twenty. Still plenty of time before he was due to call Cecca. Kanvitz's missing .32—that was the final piece of evidence that would condemn Jerry. He must have kept the weapon for some reason; otherwise, why take it from her house. Where? Not on his person, not Jerry. In his car, maybe. Or somewhere else in the house. Or out in the garage. His office downtown was also a possibility; he had a safe there, Dix remembered.

All right. Search the rest of the house, then the garage. After that … call Cecca, convince her to give him more time if he needed it. He was willing to sit there all night in the dark, waiting for Jerry to come home, and she should be willing to let him. Whatever it took to finish it.

He returned to the living room, put on the ceiling globe in there. He was opening a drawer in an old maple sideboard when he heard the noise out front. Somebody running up onto the porch, not being quiet about it. He took the Beretta out of his pocket, stood tensely listening.

The doorbell rang, a shrill ripping of the stillness.

Jerry wouldn't ring the bell. Who—?

The knob rattled, but he'd thought to reset the lock. The bell clamored again. And an agitated voice called out, “Dix? For God's sake, Dix, let me in!”

Cecca.

A fragmentary confusion gripped him. He put the gun away, crossed to the window nearest the door to peer past the shade. She was alone out there, pounding on the panel now with her fist. When he unlocked the door and pulled it open, she rushed in past him, stayed close as he pushed it shut again. In the ceiling light her face was bloodless, her eyes wide and frantic.

“What're you doing here? What happened to—”

“Amy, it's Amy. She isn't at my folks', they haven't seen or heard from her since this morning.”

“Calm down. It doesn't have to mean what you think. You know how kids are, she may be with friends—”

“No, it's him, it's Jerry. She was supposed to meet Kimberley at two, but she didn't show up. Dix, he's got her, I can feel it. He may have already … she may be …”

“Stop that, don't panic.”

“I prayed he'd have her here, that you'd found them and she was all right, but when I didn't see his car … Where would he have taken her? Where? ”

The map, the red marks on the map.