Butcher

52

His scarred countenance was the first thing she saw when her eyes opened.

“'lo,” she said in a sleepy voice.

“Have a good nap?"

“I must have. You should have slept in the bed."

“I didn't do much more'n close my eyes and I was sound asleep. Sorry about that."

“I was glad you were with me.” Her voice was soft and muffled.

“You look like a little girl in your sleep."

“Do I?"

“Mm hm."

She sat on the edge of the bed and brushed her hair. He wanted to tell her not to touch it, to say that her hair was so beautiful and sexy the way it was. He wanted to say a lot of things but he sat there, wisely keeping his mouth shut.

“What did they say to you about Dad today?"

“Nothing. They think it looks bad because of the car turning up like that. I'm sure they went through all that with you."

“The FBI man thinks it was planted there,” she said.

“Yeah, well ... if that's true, it was a stupid goddamn thing for somebody to do."

“What do you mean?"

“Who would have ever known that something happened if they'd just hid the car? Put it in the river or whatever. Now it looks like, as the cop said, foul play. Somebody trying to cover their tracks. Real dumb."

“You think Dad's—” It stuck and the pressure welled up again, but she inhaled deeply and rubbed sleep from the corner of her eye. “You think he found the Nazi?"

“He might have gotten close, yeah. The guy's been lucky up to now. I mean, nobody knew anything. They didn't know Alma Purdy, they hadn't seen your father—"

“What did you just say?” Her eyes widened.

“I said they hadn't seen him or—"

“No. Before that."

“I said they didn't know anything. They didn't know Mrs. Purdy, they hadn't seen your father."

Sharon picked up the phone and started to ask the office to connect her to the police station and then decided against it and asked for the time, thanking the woman at the desk. “When the car was left where it was, Dad's Mercury, there was no way to get through to New Madrid, right?"

“Not on that road, no.” She was going through some maps. She couldn't find what she wanted and got keys out of her voluminous purse, opened the door, and unlocked the car. Meara waited in the chair, his legs stretched straight out in front of him. “Okay,” she said, sitting down beside him and opening the maps. “Show me where the car was."

“I can show you about where it was. Um—it'd have to have been right along in here. There's W and the levee road."

“And all this was water?"

“When the car was left there? Yeah."

“And the roads to Cape are closed now, right?"

“Yeah."

“How about here? Or Sikeston? The interstate? Could anybody come around that way with the car?"

“It's possible. I mean, you want to be sneaky, you could hook the car to a chain, drag it in with a flatbed, drop it, and maybe drive the truck out afterward."

“Okay,” she said, “but what about these FBI guys and the state patrol? How did they get in?"

“Boat, I suppose. State rods might have come in through Charleston. Regional HQ is at Satellite E, not all that far. They could have spent the night here or come in by boat."

“Point is, if somebody did something to Dad they've got to be around here. Bayou City."

“Mm. They might have come through before the water was that deep, come in two days ago and left it there. See, let's say two people were working together, one drives a truck and the other rides shotgun. They come in the back, move your dad's car from wherever it's been stashed. Leave it at the water's edge, go back out, cross the shallow water over the highway to Charleston. If you knew the roads, wanted to gamble, you could have made it."

“This guy's seventy years old or something. How would he know someone with a big truck?” She was grasping for anything.

“Whoa, Sharon. You're making a case for something that's got a big hole in it. The Nazi, first, who says he's alone? If he's managed to deep-six an old gal and ... evade an experienced manhunter without leaving tracks, odds are he's got somebody helping him. Maybe these Nazi skinhead punks, maybe one of them, I dunno. It's too ... whatyacallit?"

“Hm?"

“Too perdurous? What's the stupid word. Perdurable, that's it.” He smiled. “Too problematical. Is that a word?"

She laughed in spite of herself. “Last time I looked.” She smiled back at him.

“I guess you don't want to fool around, eh?” He wanted to kiss those green eyes of hers shut and work his way down.

“Maybe later.” She smiled affectionately at him. What a character. What was not to like?

“Okay. Take a raincheck. Hey, let's go get something to eat."

“I'm not hungry."

“I am. Keep me company. Cup of coffee won't hurt."

“Okay.” What else could she do? Start building an ark?

The restaurant was called the Crystal Cafe, a homey place filled with guys wearing caps. The two waitresses called everybody by their first names and ran around with trays full of blue-plate specials and home cooking.

Sharon looked at Meara. What am I doing? Is this the mutual gravitational pull of two binary stars, or just a shoulder in the crowd? An umbrella in the storm?

Tyson-Spinks. Clay-Liston. Doakes-Weaver. Buckley-Vidal. Would Kamen-Meara rank among the all-time classic quickies?

It was cozy and pleasant in the Crystal Cafe. Warm. She felt safe with Ray, and sat there, the object of stares that more or less bounced off her awareness, until a shadow loomed over them. He was bigger than Meara, and, if possible, even rougher looking.

What happened next was odd. He sat down, not saying excuse me, never so much as glancing at her, scooting a chair up to Ray's side and beginning a long, fairly animated conversation they conducted in whispers she couldn't hear. Mostly it was the guy doing the talking, whispering in Meara's ear while Sharon tried to look at her coffee and the walls, doing her damndest not to drum her fingernails.

“I'm sorry, man,” she heard him say.

“Don't sweat it,” Meara told him. The man left as abruptly as he'd intruded, never so much as nodding to her.

Meara paid for his chopped steak, mashed potatoes, and steamed green beans just like Mom used to make, and they got up to leave. As soon as they were outside she asked him, “Who was the mystery man?"

“You mean Doug? Oh, he's just a friend. Doug Seifer. He just wanted to let me know about something."

“Oh."

When they pulled into the small motel parking lot the woman in the office stepped outside and waved at Sharon to come over. She walked into the office and the innkeeper told her, “Young's Pharmacy called while you were out. They want you to come by. Said it was important."

“Young's Pharmacy?"

“Uh-huh. They said they got a package addressed to you in care of the motel. Young's gets our packages."

“Okay. Thanks."

“I think they said it's from your father."