Dean Koontz - Whispers

Frank was already there, sitting in a back booth, still in his suit and tie, sipping Scotch.

The Bolt Hole--or simply The Hole, as regular customers referred to it--was that rare and vanishing thing: an ordinary neighborhood bar. During the past two decades, in response to a continuously fracturing and subdividing culture, the American tavern industry, at least that part of it in cities and suburbs, had indulged in a frenzy of specialization. But The Hole had successfully bucked the trend. It wasn't a gay bar. It wasn't a singles' bar or a swingers' bar. It wasn't a bar patronized primarily by bikers or truckers or show business types or off-duty policemen or account executives; its clientele was a mixture, representative of the community. It wasn't a topless go-go bar. It wasn't a rock and roll bar or a country and western bar. And, thank God, it wasn't a sports bar with one of those six-foot television screens and Howard Cosell's voice in quadraphonic sound. The Hole had nothing more to offer than pleasantly low lighting, cleanliness, courtesy, comfortable stools and booths, a jukebox that wasn't turned too loud, hot dogs and hamburgers served from the minuscule kitchen, and good drinks at reasonable prices.

Tony slid into the booth, facing Frank.

Penny, a sandy-haired waitress with pinchable cheeks and a dimpled chin, stopped by the table. She ruffled Tony's hair and said, "What do you want, Renoir?"

"A million in cash, a Rolls-Royce, eternal life, and the acclaim of the masses," Tony said.

"What'll you settle for?"

"A bottle of Coors."

"That we can provide," she said.

"Bring me another Scotch," Frank said. When she went to the bar to get their drinks, Frank said, "Why'd she call you Renoir?"

"He was a famous French painter."

"So?"

"Well, I'm a painter, too. Neither French nor famous. It's just Penny's way of teasing me."

"You paint pictures?" Frank asked.

"Certainly not houses."

"How come you never mentioned it?"

"I made a few observations about fine art a time or two," Tony said. "But you greeted the subject with a marked lack of interest. In fact, you couldn't have shown less enthusiasm if I'd wanted to debate the fine points of Swahili grammar or discuss the process of decomposition in dead babies."

"Oil paintings?" Frank asked.

"Oils. Pen and ink. Watercolors. A little bit of everything, but mostly oils."

"How long you been at it?"

"Since I was a kid."

"Have you sold any?"

"I don't paint to sell."

"What do you do it for?"

"My own satisfaction."

"I'd like to see some of your work."

"My museum has odd hours, but I'm sure a visit can be arranged."

"Museum?"

"My apartment. There's not much furniture in it, but it's chockfull of paintings."

Penny brought their drinks.

They were silent for a while, and then they talked for a few minutes about Bobby Valdez, and then they were silent again. There were about sixteen or eighteen people in the bar. Several of them had ordered sandwiches. The air was filled with the mouth-watering aroma of sizzling ground sirloin and chopped onions.

Finally, Frank said, "I suppose you're wondering why we're here like this."

"To have a couple of drinks."

"Besides that." Frank stirred his drink with a swizzle stick. Ice cubes rattled softly. "There are a few things I have to say to you."

"I thought you said them all this morning, in the car, after we left Vee Vee Gee."

"Forget what I said then."

"You had a right to say it."

"I was full of shit," Frank said.

"No, maybe you had a point."

"I tell you, I was full of shit."

"Okay," Tony said. "You were full of shit."

Frank smiled. "You could have argued with me a bit more."

"When you're right, you're right," Tony said.

"I was wrong about the Thomas woman."

"You already apologized to her, Frank."

"I feel like I should apologize to you."

"Not necessary."

"But you saw something there, saw she was telling the truth. I didn't even get a whiff of that. I was off on the wrong scent altogether. Hell, you even pushed my nose in it, and I couldn't pick up the right smell."

"Well, sticking strictly to nasal imagery, you might say you couldn't get the scent because your nose was so far out of joint."

Frank nodded glumly. His broad face seemed to sag into the melancholy mask of a bloodhound. "Because of Wilma. My nose is out of joint because of Wilma."

"Your ex-wife?"

"Yeah. You hit it right on the head this morning when you said I've been a woman-hater."

"Must have been bad, what she did to you."

"No matter what she did," Frank said, "that's no excuse for what I've let happen to me."

"You're right."

"I mean, you can't hide from women, Tony."

"They're everywhere," Tony agreed.

"Christ, you know how long it's been since I slept with a woman?"

"No."

"Ten months. Since she left me, since four months before the divorce came through."

Tony couldn't think of anything to say. He didn't feel he knew Frank well enough to engage in an intimate discussion of his sex life, yet it was obvious that the man badly needed someone to listen and care.

"If I don't get back in the swim pretty soon," Frank said, "I might as well go away and be a priest."

Tony nodded. "Ten months sure is a long time," he said awkwardly.

Frank didn't respond. He stared into his Scotch as he might have stared into a crystal ball, trying to see his future. Clearly, he wanted to talk about Wilma and the divorce and where he should go from here, but he didn't want to feel that he was forcing Tony to listen to his trouble. He had a lot of pride. He wanted to be coaxed, cajoled, drawn out with questions and murmured sympathy.

"Did Wilma find another man or what?" Tony asked, and knew immediately that he had gone to the heart of the matter much too quickly.

Frank was not ready to talk about that part of it, and he pretended not to hear the question. "What bothers me is the way I'm screwing up in my work. I've always been damned good at what I do. Just about perfect, if I say so myself. Until the divorce. Then I turned sour on women, and pretty soon I went sour on the job, too." He took a long pull on his Scotch. "And what the hell's going on with that damned crazy Napa County Sheriff? Why would he lie to protect Bruno Frye?"

"We'll find out sooner or later," Tony said.

"You want another drink?"

"Okay."

Tony could see that they were going to be sitting in The Bolt Hole for a long while. Frank wanted to talk about Wilma, wanted to get rid of all the poison that had been building up in him and eating at his heart for nearly a year, but he was only able to let it out a drop at a time.

***

It was a busy day for Death in Los Angeles. Many died of natural causes, of course, and therefore were not required by law to come under a coroner's probing scalpel. But the medical examiner's office had nine others with which to deal. There were two traffic fatalities in an accident certain to involve charges of criminal negligence. Two men were dead of gunshot wounds. One child had apparently been beaten to death by a mean-tempered drunken father. A woman had drowned in her own swimming pool, and two young men had died of what appeared to be drug overdoses. And there was Bruno Frye.

At 7:10 Thursday evening, hoping to catch up on the backlog of work, a pathologist at the city morgue completed a limited autopsy on the body of Bruno Gunther Frye, male, Caucasian, age forty. The doctor did not find it necessary to dissect the corpse beyond the general area of the two abdominal traumata, for he was swiftly able to determine that the deceased definitely had perished from those injuries and no other. The upper wound was not critical; the knife tore muscle tissue and grazed a lung. But the lower wound was a mess; the blade ripped open the stomach, pierced the pyloric vein, and damaged the pancreas, among other things. The victim had died of massive internal bleeding.