The Man in the Tree

Chapter Twenty-three

The cab driver let Cooley off in front of the railroad station in Springfield. It was black dark, and cold. He went into the station carrying the attaché case; it weighed only about five pounds, but it felt like fifty. He sat with it between his knees until the train pulled in. The conductor helped him up the steps. "There you go, Gramp."

There was a three-hour wait between trains in New York. On the Florida train, the heat wasn't working in the dining car, and the food was worse than he remembered, but his compartment was comfortable; an "economy bedroom" was what they called it now. He slept fairly well, and at eleven the next morning he was in Tampa. He got a cab and went looking for a motel. The first one was not what he wanted: the lobby was too small and too crowded. "That's a fleabag," he told the driver when he came out. "Isn't there a decent motel in this town?"

The next one was just right; it had a big lobby with a lot of furniture and planters, and there didn't seem to he many people around.

Cooley had lunch in the coffee shop and made a phone call from his room, then went down to the desk to check out.

"You're not staying with us tonight, then?" the clerk said. He looked disapproving.

"No, something's come up. A friend of mine's going to come for me in an hour or so -- I'll just wait over there out of the way. How long's it take to get to the airport from here?"

"About twenty minutes, sir."

The lobby was empty. At the far end there were two big wing chairs facing each other. Cooley knelt on the floor, opened the attaché case and lifted out the explosive device. He had to get his legs under the chair, supporting the device on his knees, before he could attach it the way Jacobs had shown him. When he finished, he was sweating and dizzy. He closed the attaché case, which also contained his toothbrush and a change of underwear, and sat down to wait.

They were finishing lunch when the phone rang; Irma leaned over to answer it. "Anderson residence. . . . Who shall I say is calling?" After a moment she punched the hold button and said, "His name is McIver, and he says it's about your parents."

"McIver," said Gene refiectively, and shook his head. "Put it on tape, Irma, and turn on the speaker.", When she had done so, he took the phone and said, "Mr. McIver, this is Gene Anderson. What's this about my parents?"

The voice that came into the room was thin and high-pitched, an old man's voice. "Gene, you don't remember me, I guess, but I used to work with your father in Dog River when you was a boy. You know they moved away about a year after you left."

"Yes. Mr. McIver, how did you find me here?"

"Well, I have a friend in St. Pete, he's in real estate, and when he happened to mention your name and said you was a giant, why, I figured that's got to be the same Gene Anderson that I knew back then."

"What is your friend's name?"

"His name is Russ Lafler. Now I don't know if you know, Gene, that your parents both died in Chehalis in nineteen fifty-six."

"Yes, I know that."

"Well, I have reason to believe that their death may not of been accidental. I don't want to talk too much about this on the phone, but there's certain information I have that I think you'd like to know. I'm in Tampa for a day or two, staying at the Costa Brava Motel, do you know where it's at?"

"I can find it." Gene nodded at Irma, who took the Tampa directory from the shelf and began turning the pages. "Would it be convenient if I came over this afternoon, say in about an hour?"

"Yes, that'd be fine. I'll be in the lobby, Gene, because from what I hear you wouldn't fit into a motel room too good."

"I appreciate that. In an hour then, Mr. McIver."

At Gene's nod, Irma turned off the phone. "What was that all about?"

Gene's face was stony. "There was a man who worked with my father -- his name might have been McIver, I don't remember. Irma, see if you can find a Russ Lafler under real estate."

They looked at each other silently. Irma opened the St. Petersburg directory to the yellow pages. After a moment she said, "Here's an Aldridge and Lafler Realtors."

"Call them."

She punched the number. A woman's voice said, "Aldridge and Lafler, serving the Suncoast, may I help you?"

"I'd like to speak to Russ Lafler, please."

"I'm sorry, he's out of town till the twenty-first."

Gene nodded; she said, "Thank you," and turned off the phone.

For a moment no one spoke; then Pongo asked, "You think this is some kind of scam?"

Gene spread his big hands on the table. Margaret, watching him, thought she had never seen him look like this before. He said slowly, "It might be. Or maybe that really is McIver. But I don't think so. I think it's a man who tried to kill me in nineteen sixty-five. It's been twenty years; he's an old man now. I thought I was all through with him. Irma, call information in Amherst, Massachusetts, and get a number for Thomas or Tom Cooley. What time is it there?"

"Same as here -- we're in the same zone." She made the call, wrote a number on her pad, and looked questioningly at Gene.

"Dial it."

They heard the buzz of the ringing signal. Then a woman's voice: "Hello?"

"Mr. Cooley, please," said Gene.

"He ain't here."

"Can you tell me where to reach him?"

"He went to New York Sunday. I told him, but would he listen to me? No. Why would he listen to me, I'm just his damn housekeeper. You call back next week." The telephone clicked and buzzed.

"What are you going to do?" Irma asked.

"I'm going over there."

"That's dumb. Let me call the police."

"And tell them what? He hasn't committed any crime that I can prove. He's an old man -- they'd laugh at me. If they question him and let him go, what will he do next?"

"I'm going with you," said Pongo. "I'll bring the Monster around -- give me a couple of minutes."

Pongo backed the motor home out of the garage, drove it around to the cottage, and got his gun. He tucked the gun under his waistband, put on a Madras jacket to cover it, and a hat to go with the jacket.

Gene was waiting outside the kitchen door. "All dressed up?" he said as he got in.

"Sure. Social occasion."

Gene was silent and glum on the way over to Tampa. It was a fine winter afternoon, cool and clear. Pongo pulled into the motel parking lot; there were only a few cars there. The motel was two stories tall, with stairs and balconies all around. They walked in; the lobby seemed empty. "I'll ask at the desk," Pongo said. The desk clerk, a slender young man, was looking at them with round eyes.

"Wait a minute," said Gene. He nodded. "Over there."

At the far end of the lobby, partly concealed by a planter, there was a pair of green upholstered chairs. In one of the chairs an old man was sitting quietly, looking at nothing.

"Is that him?" Pongo asked in an undertone.

"I don't know."

The old man looked up as they approached. His bald head shone; what hair he had left was wispy and white, as fine as milkweed floss. His skin was baby pink, with an underlying waxy pallor. He watched them without expression through his rimless spectacles.

"Are you Mr. McIver?"

"That's right." The old man put out a flaccid hand. "'Scuse me if I don't get up; I've got some trouble with my legs."

"This is Bill Richards, Mr. McIver." Gene sat down facing the old man, and Pongo pulled over another chair.

"Glad to know you," said McIver in his piping voice. "Now, Gene, I s'pose you know that whatever I tell you is between us. Your folks are dead and gone, nothing we can do about that. But it just kind of nagged at me, you know -- " He was craning his neck and blinking as he looked up at Gene. "My gosh, they told me you was big, but I didn't have any idea. How tall are you, anyway?"

"I'm a little over eight and a half feet, Mr. McIver. Now about this information you say you have -- "

The old man sighed and groped for something in the pocket of his jacket. The jacket was too big for him, and so was his shirt collar. There was something wrong with his hands: they were limp and hung unnaturally from his wrists. "Back in 'fifty-six," he said, "I was visiting your folks in Chehalis." He seemed to be struggling to grasp something in his pocket; at last he brought it out, holding it awkwardly between thumb and two fingers. It was a pack of cigarettes. "Smoke?" he said, holding it out.

"No, thanks," said Gene, and Pongo shook his head.

The old man fumbled a cigarette out of the pack and put it in his mouth. "I was staying with them when it happened," he said. "This isn't easy to talk about, Gene, but you know the house burned down and they was both killed in the fire."

"Yes."

The old man reached into his other pocket and brought out a heavy chrome lighter. When he tried to press the lever down, his fingers slipped; they seemed to have no more strength than a baby's. "Would you mind?" he said, holding it out. "Tell you the truth, it isn't just my legs -- it's my hands, too."

Gene lit the lighter and offered it. The old man leaned forward, but did not touch his cigarette to the flame. "Now, Mr. Anderson," he said, "keep your thumb on that thing if you want to stay alive." His voice had changed; it was a little deeper and firmer. "If you take your thumb off," he said, "there's a plastic bomb under your chair that'll blow sky high. And if you try to get up, that'!l make it blow too."

Pongo reached under his jacket, put his hand on the gun.

"Don't do that, Pongo," said Gene without looking around. He bent forward and blew out the lighter flame; his thumb was steady on the mechanism. "You're Tom Cooley," he said.

The old man blinked, then chuckled a little. "Didn't think you'd recognize me."

"I didn't. It's been thirty years -- you must be close to seventy, and you're ill. What's the matter with you?"

"Not a damn thing that concerns you," said the old man, coloring a little. "Well, I guess it does, though, because if it hadn't of been for you, my boy Paul and my cousin Jerry would be alive, and my wife too, probably. You killed them, all three."

"If there's a bomb under my chair, and if it blows up, it'll kill you too," said Gene.

"It's what they call a shaped charge. It'll blow straight up, right through your ass, Mr. Anderson. Probably cut off your legs and leave 'em flopping on the floor, while the rest of you goes splat on the ceiling. Yes sir, just a big red smear on the ceiling." He took the unlit cigarette out of his mouth and dropped it.

"Did you kill my parents?"

The old man snorted. "Hell, no. I wasn't even there. That was just a story, but it got you here, didn't it?"

"What do you want?"

The old man smiled, with a gleam of false teeth. "Just want to watch you hanging from the ceiling, and your legs flopping on the floor."

Pongo moved slightly; the old man turned to look at him. "That bomb is armed now," he said. "Touch it or try to move it, and that'll set it off too."

Gene closed his eyes. One hand held the lighter steady; the other dropped between his knees, near the skirt of the chair. "Careful!" the old man said sharply.

After a moment Gene withdrew his hand; his eyes opened. "I want you to know," he said, "that Paul's death was an accident. About your cousin, I don't know what happened. I think he shot me."

"Well, you sure as hell shot him," said the old man. A curious look of anxiety came into his eyes.

"No," said Gene. He set the lighter down on the arm of his chair. The old man's eyes bulged in horror, and his body jerked once.

Gene was bending forward, groping with one hand under the chair. After a moment he brought out a cylindrical object about the size of a Frisbee. He held it up solemnly, then opened his hands: the thing was gone.

"God almighty!" said the old man. His body was trembling all over. "How did you -- Where -- ?"

Gene's lips and nostrils were compressed; he was breathing unsteadily, and his eyes had a distant look. Slowly he bent forward and took the old man's arms. "What's wrong with you?" he said.

The old man tried to pull away but could not; his eyes squeezed shut, his face flushed, and his head dropped forward; he was sobbing angrily and helplessly. "Here," said Gene, as if to himself. "Here. And the legs too?" His hands began to move down the old man's thighs.

"Wait," he said after a moment. He knelt on the floor and leaned his body close against the old man's, pressing himself against his chest and arms and legs. Over his shoulder the old man's face stared madly, his glasses awry, eyes bleared. His mouth opened and shut, opened and shut.

"Excuse me, is there anything wrong here?" It was the desk clerk.

Pongo turned his head. "No, everything's okay."

Gene slowly leaned back again, running his hands down the old man's shoulders and arms, then his legs. "Let's see now," he muttered. Stand up."

The old man stared at him, then at his own hands. There was a change. They looked like hands now, and not like flaccid yellowish gloves. He put them together unbelievingly, then laid them on the arms of the chair and slowly got to his feet. He took a step, then another. Tears began to leak down his face. "Did you -- did you -- ?" he said.

"Mr. McIver, do you want me to call a doctor?" the clerk asked.

"Maybe that's a good idea," Gene said. His face had lost its distant expression; his eyes glittered. "Let's get him up to his room."

"Mr. McIver has already checked out," the clerk said.

"Give us another room, then. Pongo, take care of it."

Pongo went to the desk with the clerk. When he got back, the old man was sitting down with his glasses pushed up on his forehead, hands covering his eyes. "Son of a bitch, God damn," he was saying in a breathless voice, over and over.

Pongo put a hand under his arm. "Come on, let's go."

They got the old man into the elevator and along the corridor. Pongo said, "The doctor'll be here in about ten minutes." He opened the room door, led the old man inside, and made him sit in a chair. He was laughing and crying, with his hands over his face.

After a while there was a tap on the door; Gene opened it. The man who stood there was slender, with a bald brown forehead and a dark mustache. He looked up at Gene in surprise, then at the old man. "I'm Dr. Montoya," he said. "Is this the patient?" He set down his bag and looked at Cooley. "What happened here?"

"He had a shock," Pongo said.

Montoya bent over the old man. "I'm the doctor. How are you feeling?"

"Feeling!" said Cooley, and looked up. His cheeks were still wet with tears. "I'm feeling fine!" He began to laugh, his face contorted as if in pain.

"Will you wait outside while I examine him, please?" Montoya opened his bag.

They stood in the corridor. It was clean and bright. The dry, cool air had a flowery scent of antiseptic. After a long time the door opened and Montoya stepped out, carrying his bag. "I gave him a tranquilizer," he said. "I don't know yet if he should be hospitalized or not." He gave Gene an appraising glance. "You're a pituitary giant, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Are you in the circus?"

"No. Retired."

"I want your name and address." He took out a black notebook. When he had finished writing, he said to Pongo, "And yours."

"It's the same."

Montoya put the notebook away. "Mr. Anderson, this man told me he was cured just now of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. He does not show any sign of that disease. Did he seem confused or delusional to you?"

"No. He had it, and I cured him."

Montoya's eyebrows went up. "You cured him? How did you do that?"

"I put my hands on him."

"You are telling me that you cured this man by laying on of hands."

"Yes."

"Mr. Anderson, I find that very hard to believe."

"I know."

Montoya took out his wallet. "Here is my card. I am going now, but I think someone should stay with him for a little while. If there is any problem, call me."

"All right. Thank you, Doctor."

Montoya nodded stiffly and walked away toward the elevator. When he was gone, Gene opened the door and they went in.

Cooley was standing at the window with his hands clasped together, squeezing hard enough to turn his fingers pink and yellow. He looked up; his face was no longer contorted, but his eyes were red.

"You all right now?" Gene asked.

"Sure," said Cooley in a low voice.

"Are you hungry?"

"No." After a moment Cooley added, "Just leave me the hell alone, will you?"

Gene's eyes were still bright, but his expression had changed. "Pongo, wait for me in the Monster," he said.

Pongo stepped out; the door closed behind him. He listened a moment, then walked down the stairs.

"Is everything all right?" the desk clerk asked.

"Sure."

"Do you know how long Mr. McIver will be staying?"

"Beats me."

Pongo walked out to the parking lot, got into the mobile home, lighted a cigar, and waited.

In a few minutes he saw Gene coming toward him. The giant climbed in, sat down in the chair beside the driver's seat.

"What did you do?" Pongo asked.

"I talked to him. I told him I wasn't expecting any gratitude, but if he ever tried anything like that again, I would probably kill him. After a while he cried again -- different kind of crying, not so much anger. I think he's going to be okay." He leaned over and hugged Pongo for a moment. "Let's go home."

Pongo started the engine and maneuvered the motor home out of the lot. "You could have killed him, in the lobby, but you cured him instead. How come?"

"I didn't know I was going to do it. I didn't know I could do it. It was -- " Gene hesitated. "It felt just like a big hand pushing me in the back."