A Tap on the Window

Fifty-six

“You know,” I said, suddenly steering Claire hard left, away from the door, “I need to check one thing before we go anywhere.”

“What are you—”

I was pretty sure she hadn’t seen the blood. If she had, she’d have reacted. Rushed inside, screamed, something. But I could tell, judging by how her body had tensed, that she knew something was wrong.

“Shh,” I said. Then, in a more normal voice that was just slightly louder than necessary, “I don’t know whether we should take both cars back or whether we should all go back in mine.”

We were up against the cottage wall, between the glass doors and a set of windows. There was a second set of three steps here that led down from the deck. I had the Glock in my hand as I whispered to Claire, “Get under the deck.”

She started to ask why, but I put my finger to my lips and gave her a stern, urgent look, then pointed. She slipped down the steps, got on her knees, and crawled into the roughly two feet of space below the deck.

I went down the steps, too, but kept on walking along the edge of the cottage, maintaining a conversation. “We’re going to need you and Dennis to make a full statement, explain this whole thing from the beginning. I know it’s not going to be easy, having to talk about this, but there really isn’t any choice.”

Whoever it was had a silencer on his gun. I hadn’t heard a shot when I was out on the dock with Claire. Not that so-called silenced guns don’t make a sound. But down by the water, it might not have made much more noise than a snapped twig. I hadn’t heard a car pull up, either. Our shooter had probably parked a ways down the road, then hiked in.

I’d had my eyes on the rearview mirror the whole way here. There were long stretches on the interstate, and coming down from it to the Cayuga Lake area, when there had not been another car on the road at all.

But someone knew I was here. Someone had followed me. There had to be a second GPS device in my car. Not just the one under the backseat. I should have checked the rocker panels, or looked inside that damn spare tire.

As I crept along the edge of the cottage, I strained to hear anyone moving inside. A floorboard creak, a door opening or closing. Anything that would give me a sense of where he was. I looked forward, then back at the open sliding glass door, then forward again. The ground was layered with fallen leaves. If someone came out the back of the cottage and started walking around, there was a good chance I’d hear something.

The cottage sat on a high foundation, so when I reached a regular window, as opposed to those floor-to-ceiling glass doors, I had to duck only a few inches not to be seen. I wasn’t keen on getting shot in the head.

I glanced quickly at Claire Sanders, huddled under the deck, eyes wide with fear.

I continued with my monologue. “I know you may not think much of Chief Perry, but he’s a good man, and we can trust him.” Just because I was saying these things didn’t mean I had to believe them. “And the first thing we’re going to want to do is let your father know you’re okay. And your mother. This has been a very difficult time for both of them.”

I’d reached the corner of the cottage, my back glued to the wall. I peered around the edge, saw no one, slithered around to the other wall. From that vantage point, I could just barely see up to the road. Through the trees I could see a dark-colored pickup with tinted windows parked there.

“And I’m not saying that about the chief because he’s my brother-in-law. If anything, that kind of leads me to think of him as a total asshole. Sometimes he is, and I know he and your dad have been having a running battle, but the fact is, when it comes to being a lawman, I think he more or less knows what he’s doing.”

Sooner or later, someone was going to think it odd that Claire wasn’t contributing to this conversation.

“My wife, Donna, she’ll defend him till the cows come home, but she grew up with him and she knows what he’s—”

Leaves rustling. Around the next corner. Someone was creeping along the back wall of the cottage.

“—like, so she’ll only defend him for so long, you know, and—”

It happened fast.

The barrel of the gun appeared first, and as I’d figured, there was a silencer screwed onto the end of it. A millisecond later, the whole gun, and the hand that was holding it. A glimpse of a jacket cuff.

I fired.

The shot rang out in the cool morning air. Birds in nearby trees broke into frightened flight.

It was more reflex than anything. I should have waited another half second, for a body to appear. Would have given me a better chance of actually hitting something. But the truth was, I’d never fired my weapon in the line of duty before. Not as a cop, and not since I’d gone private.

So it was no surprise I failed to hit that hand. It withdrew instantly at the sound of the shot. There was the sound of more leaves rustling. Faster this time. Running.

And another noise, one I wished hadn’t been made. Claire shouting, “Mr. Weaver? What was that?”

The man — I’d figured it was a man, and a glimpse of that hand proved it to me — was on the move, running around the cottage. I went the other way. I didn’t want the shooter coming upon where Claire was hiding before I got there. He’d have heard her and would have a good idea where to look.

I moved back to the first corner I’d rounded, took a peek around it, then hugged the wall that faced the lake, which gave me a view of the deck. Claire was crawling out from under it.

“Stay under there!” I screamed.

“Dennis!” she shouted, ignoring me. “Dennis, someone’s shooting!”

She grabbed the railing, started mounting the steps to the deck, heading for the sliding glass doors.

“Goddamn it!” I yelled at her.

The barrel of a gun appeared around the far corner of the cottage, then two outstretched arms.

“Claire!”

She glanced back at me.

I heard a sound like someone lightly hammering a nail, once. He’d taken a shot. The wood railing by Claire’s hand splintered.

Claire went down.

The top half of her body landed on the deck, her legs splayed across the steps.

“No!”

The word came out of me as a primal scream of anguish.

But then Claire stirred, pushed herself up. She hadn’t been hit. She’d tripped on the stairs.

I raised my Glock and fired over her, putting a bullet into the corner of the cottage. Fired again. And again. Thinking maybe I could shoot the bastard through the building.

I moved to the corner, hugging the wall, crouched down, so that when I peered around it, my head would be lower than he’d be expecting. I kept the Glock gripped in both hands, held my breath, hoping to hear something besides the pounding of my heart in my ears.

More rustling.

Distant running.

I peeked around the corner.

He was on the move.

Almost to the end of the road that led in here. Running flat out. Dark pants, black Windbreaker with a hood up. I sprinted after him. I could see he was headed for the pickup.

He stopped suddenly, turned, pointed his weapon my way. I threw myself to the ground like I was tackling an imaginary football player, heard a bullet slice the air over me.

More running.

By the time I was on my feet, he’d reached the truck and was getting in. It sped off, tires kicking up gravel. I wasn’t close enough to see a plate before the vehicle disappeared beyond a curve in the road.

Back at the cottage, another scream.

I ran back, coming around the front side. Claire stood at the sliding doors, looking inside, a hand floating over her mouth.

She didn’t have to step inside to see what had happened to Dennis. He was sprawled on his side by the kitchen table, his back to us. The chair had tipped over with him when he’d gone down. The blood puddling its way toward the middle of the room was coming from a hole in the back of his head.

“No no no no,” she whispered.

“Stay here,” I said, sliding the door open and delicately entering the room, careful to avoid stepping in the blood. I knelt next to him, put two fingers to the side of his neck. A futile gesture, I knew, but I had to be sure. I looked through the door into the bedroom, at a tiny hole in the screen in the window on the far wall. The killer’d never stepped inside; he’d just aimed from outside and taken his shot. Didn’t have to shoot through glass, so we didn’t hear anything down by the water.

I stood, saw that black notebook on the kitchen table, picked it up and slipped it into the pocket of my jacket.

“Dennis,” Claire said, standing just inside the door. “Dennis?”

“We have to get out of here,” I said. “That man may come back, or he may be waiting for us down the road.”

Claire was trembling, both hands over her mouth. I was worried she might be going into shock.

“Claire, listen to me. We have to get out of here.”

I’d already decided I didn’t want to take my car. It still had a GPS device hidden in it somewhere. I could get the keys to the Volvo, but there was only one way out, down North Parker Road, and we could be driving into an ambush.

I looked out at the lake.

“What’s over there?” I asked.

“We have to get him to the hospital,” Claire said quietly. “We have to get a doctor.”

“Claire, Dennis is dead. I have to get you out of here. The other side of the lake, it looks like it’s only a mile away. What’s over there?”

“Union Springs,” she whispered.

“A town?”

“A little town.”

I grabbed her by the wrist with my left hand, the gun still in my right. “We’re going to take the boat. We’re going to run like hell to the dock and get in the boat. Do you know if there’s gas in the tank?”

“How do you know he’s dead?” she said. “How can you be sure?”

“Claire!” I said sharply. “Is there gas in the boat?”

“I... I think so. Dennis and I went out in it yesterday. Just wandering around.”

“Come on.”

We ran down the hill to the dock. I got her into the boat first, put her in the middle of the three seats. I stepped in, lowered the motor so the prop was in the water, gave the rubber bulb on the fuel line several squeezes, put the motor in neutral, pulled the choke, and yanked on the cord.

It started on the first pull. I shoved the choke back in, powered the throttle back, then untied the stern and bow lines from the dock. I pushed off, put the gear lever into forward, and cranked it. It was cold out on the lake. Claire had no jacket. I slipped mine off and gave it to her. She put her arms into it robotically, her eyes glazed.

It only took about five minutes to cross Cayuga. There was a marina up ahead. Lots of docks, but only a few boats still in the water. A huge building just up from the shore where people stored boats for the winter. I found a spot to tie the boat up, jumped onto the dock and helped Claire out.

“Is there a business area?” I asked her.

She raised a weak finger. “That way, I think.”

We walked briskly up Basin Street to North Cayuga, which seemed to pass for the main drag around here. I saw a used-car dealer across the street. I didn’t have to hold on to Claire’s wrist all the time; she was keeping up with me. But she was so dazed I held her hand as we crossed the road. She wasn’t in a state of mind where I could trust her to look both ways.

We went straight into the sales office. A heavyset man in an ill-fitting blue suit got up from behind his desk, turned on a smile like he’d just flipped a switch, and approached us. But his smile didn’t last long. We didn’t look like typical customers, Claire’s eyes red from crying, and me sweating profusely.

There was also the small matter of the Glock strapped to my waist.

“We need a car,” I said.

His eyes on the gun, he said. “Take whatever you want.”

“I’m not stealing one,” I said. “I’ll rent one.” I got out my wallet, showed him my private investigator’s license, and handed him my Visa card. “How’s five hundred?”

He took the card. “Sure. And I’m going to need to see your driver’s license.”

“You’re going to do this fast,” I said.

“Of course.”

He did, too. Within two minutes he was handing me a set of keys to a white Subaru sedan.

I said to him, “Call the police. There’s been a murder directly across the lake. Brown cottage, front doors on the lake side open. Tell them the shooter may still be in the area. Male, five ten to six feet. He’s driving a dark-colored pickup truck. Black, dark blue, tinted windows. You got that?”

“Yeah,” he said.

I hustled Claire into the front seat of the Subaru and got myself behind the wheel.

“We’re going home,” I told her.

We went north through the village of Cayuga, then headed east through the Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge. Once we’d driven out the other side of it, I found my way back to the thruway. It was the same interchange where I’d gotten off. Before I rolled through the tollgate and picked up my ticket, I asked Claire if she needed anything.

“I don’t know,” she said.

I pulled into a gas station — as it turned out, I’d rented a car that had less than a quarter of a tank in it — and filled up. Then I ran into the convenience store and loaded up on bottled water, candy bars, potato chips. Anything to keep us going.

“Help yourself,” I said when I got back into the car.

As I was grabbing my ticket and speeding up the ramp to get back on the thruway, Claire looked into the bag and pulled out a Mars bar. It pleased me when she peeled back the wrapper and took a bite.

“I’ve got questions, Claire. Can you handle some questions?”

She chewed some candy, swallowed, and looked blankly at me. “I guess.” She sounded like she was in a trance.

“Do you know who it was? Do you know who killed Dennis?”

“I didn’t see him,” she said.

“But do you have an idea?’

She nodded.

“Who?”

“Phyllis Pearce’s son,” Claire said.

“What? She has a son? Who’s that?”

“You don’t know?” she asked.

I waited.

“Ricky Haines,” Claire said. “The cop. Maybe the creepiest guy on the Griffon force, because he’s all nice, but when he starts feeling you up, you start thinking maybe he’s not what he pretends to be.”