Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 116, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 709 & 710, September/October 2000

Customer’s Choice by Brendan DuBois

After taking a break from his series work to write a “big book,” a thriller which imagines bow the world might have been different had JFK lived (see Resurrection Day), Brendan DuBois is back at work on his Lewis Cole mystery novels. EQMM takes pride in the New Hampshire author’s accomplishments, for he debuted in our Department of First Stories in 1986, and now writes for many other magazines, including Playboy.

About ten minutes after Clay Wilson backed his van up the gently curving driveway to the large house on the lake, he knew it was going to be a long and dreary day, due to two things.

The first was that when he started unloading his photo gear from the van, the lady of the house — Chrissy Tate — refused to help him. Oh, he wasn’t expecting her to hump in the long, heavy cardboard boxes with the tripods and light gear, but it would have been nice if she had been at the door, opening it up for him while he trooped in and out of the home. Instead, after a quick and bubbly handshake and hello, she had gone back to the long granite counter in the well-lit kitchen, where she sipped a tall glass of orange juice and leafed through a thick Ethan Allen furniture catalogue. Even with her back to him, he knew the attitude. He was invisible, he was hired help, he didn’t count. And hired help can wrestle with the front door on their own, thank you very much.

The second was what he saw when he got into the wide living room with the floor-to-ceiling windows that boasted a grand view of a thick green lawn that ran down to the lake’s edge. Down on the black-blue waters was a dock that had a moored powerboat and sailboat bobbing in some slight swells, adjacent to a white-shingled boathouse. In the living room the furniture looked like it had been purchased and placed by five-hundred-dollar-an-hour consultants. The flooring was beige carpeting by the entryway and tan tile by the window, where a brass telescope rested. There was a television set the size of a Buick on the far wall, along with a fully-stocked wet bar and shelves that held knick-knacks, trophies, and photographs, and not a single book.

Then Clay spotted the well-lit artificial Christmas tree near the couch. The dark green tree looked fine, with lots of tinsel and garlands and blinking lights, and around the base was a collection of decorated gifts, complete with ribbons and bows. But it made him stop and take notice, and to know that it was going to be a dreary day.

It was, after all, the second week in June.

Chrissy came over from the kitchen, a big smile on her face, a smile from the customer to the hired help. She had on tight stone-washed jeans, white high-heeled shoes, and a red, sleeveless pullover blouse that was filled out nicely up top. Her arms were quite tanned and the sunlight captured the fine hairs on the back of her arms.

“I see you’ve noticed my props,” she said, giggling. Her teeth were white and perfect, and her blond hair hung back in a simple ponytail. It was the simplest thing in the whole damn house, and when Clay had stepped in, he’d started pricing everything he saw, and knew within ninety seconds there was a million dollars’ worth of home here, on a couple million dollars’ worth of land, and God knew how many gadgets and such. Hell, the damn place had a three-car garage, and that boathouse by the water was the size of some homes in town.

“You’re right, Mrs. Tate, I did notice that,” he said, putting down a box of camera gear and accessories. “Is that what you want, a portrait of you and your husband with the Christmas tree in the background?”

She strolled across the living room with the self-confidence of a woman who knows she’s being watched and doesn’t mind it a bit. She sat down on the couch and picked up a leather-bound volume and gestured Clay to come over.

“Please, you can call me Chrissy,” she said. “And my husband’s name is Jack. He’s upstairs in his office, working. Even on a Saturday, he’s working, checking on his investments, his stocks. Look, this is what we want for your time and trouble.”

He sat down next to her, conscious of his own worn sneakers, his old jeans that had been stained time and time again with darkroom chemicals, and his black long-sleeved turtleneck shirt. It was a warm day but he kept the sleeves down. He always tried to keep the sleeves down.

Chrissy opened the book wide so that one side of it rested on his lap, and Clay was sure that didn’t happen by accident. It was a photo album of sorts, with glassine pages holding in postcards. Actually, he noted, looking closer, they were Christmas cards, the ones that show photos of couples or children or happy homes. He saw Chrissy and a tall man with a thick moustache who he supposed was her husband on one page, and another couple, about the same age, on the other. The other woman had bright red hair and the other man was hefty, a guy who looked like he gained lots of pounds sitting behind a desk. Dueling Christmas cards, side by side.

She tapped the other couple’s photos with a long red fingernail. “This is Blake Emerson and his wife Terry. Blake and my husband Jack were in the same frat at MIT, and they’ve been friends ever since. And very competitive friends as well; Blake never lets Jack forget that he was the first to make a million, and that he had the bank and brokerage statements to prove it.”

Clay, who had a hard time imagining a hundred thousand dollars, just nodded. “And the competition never lets up. Ever. Whether it’s sailing or riding or running, Jack and Blake have to constantly outdo each other.” She laughed, very easily, and Clay wondered if orange juice was all that she had been drinking this morning. “It’s even gotten to our Christmas cards. Here, let me show you.”

She pointed out the first set of cards. “Here, this is when it was easy. Here they are, with a picture in front of the State House. Here we are, a year later, Jack and me, in front of the White House. Here they are, on a Hawaiian beach. Here we are, in the Swiss Alps. There they are, last year, at a base camp below Mount Everest, if you can believe it. Now that one got Jack plenty steamed, I don’t mind telling you.”

Clay wondered, as he looked over the photos, if there was anything she minded telling him. He had lived in northern New England all of his life and had been to Boston exactly seven times and New York City once. The two couples in the exotic pictures looked rich and content and very happy, and even Clay was surprised at how quickly and deeply he now disliked them.

He looked over at the brightly lit tree. “I’m sorry, I still don’t get it. You want me to take a Christmas-card photo, and not a portrait?”

She made a production of closing the photo album while the back of her hand brushed his right thigh. “That’s right, and we want it to be a... um, well, it’ll all sound so silly, but we’re looking for something... unique.”

He nodded. He knew what was coming. About ninety-nine point nine percent of his portrait work was straightforward enough. The happy bride and groom uttering low insults to each other while maintaining their wide smiles for the camera’s benefit. The proud mom and dad with the newborn who either puked or howled during the studio time. And the ever-popular family portrait, trying to line up twenty-three aunts, uncles, cousins, brothers, and sisters, some of whom hated to be in the same time zone as their closest blood relatives.

Then there was the other point-one percent of his work. Glamour photography, some called it. Others called it soft-core or low-rent porn. Whatever. If this young woman wanted a picture of herself and her husband in boots, leather gear, and Christmas ornaments in front of an artificial tree, for the benefit of their rich friends, so be it. He would still make a pretty good bundle today, and would probably get to see this empty and pretty young thing out of her jeans and tight sleeveless blouse. Maybe it wasn’t going to be a dreary day after all.

Then Mrs. Tate surprised him.

“Oh,” she said, smiling widely. “I bet you thought we wanted something naughty, right? Like me in a nightie and Jack in a jockstrap or something.”

“Uh, the thought did occur to me,” he said, feeling slightly embarrassed and not enjoying the sensation at all.

She laughed again and quickly touched his leg. “Oh, nothing as plain or droll as that. It’s just that I wanted to put Blake and Terry in their place. I had this idea, a theme really, of what to put on our Christmas card. You see, I wanted something that said ‘Christmas Was a Killer This Year,’ and have a picture of the two of us on the couch. Dead.”

“Dead?”

An enthusiastic nod. “Dead, yes. The two of us on the couch, next to the tree and the gifts, and quite dead.” She giggled. “Nice and still and dead. Don’t you get it? ‘Christmas Was a Killer This Year.’ Let’s see if they can top that one.”

He literally had no idea what to say next, and was saved when there was a clumping sound from the stairs at the far wall, and Mr. Jack Tate came into view. Clay stood up as the other man strode over. He was a few inches taller than Clay and had on summer clothes that said he was well-off and enjoying himself mightily: light pink polo shirt, khaki shorts with a thin leather belt, gold watch on one wrist and gold chain on the other, and deck shoes that looked a week old. His face was unlined and tanned, and he had a thick moustache. His black hair was cut short and was sprinkled with gray; his wife squealed a greeting and stood up and kissed him on the cheek.

“Jack Tate,” he said, holding out his hand, and Clay resisted an urge to say, Oh? I thought you were Raoul, the local gigolo. Clay shook hands and let the other man win the fist-clenching, knuckle-popping contest. Jack had a pleased grin, thinking that he had just out-squeezed the photographer, while Clay kept his grin to himself, knowing that if he wanted to, with an extra squeeze, he could have taken him down to his knees and broken that fine-looking nose with a jab from his elbow.

Jack Tate put his arm around his wife. “Did Chrissy tell you about her crazy idea?”

“Yes, she did at that.”

“Oh, hon,” she protested, “it’s not such a crazy idea.”

Oh yes, it is, Clay thought. He spoke up. “Just so I’m straight on this, you want a Christmas-card photo showing the two of you dead, on this couch. In color.”

“That’s right,” Chrissy said. “Will that be a problem?”

Problem? He thought about bringing these two back to reality. He thought about telling them that about a mile or two from this home — hell, mansion! — were families living in house trailers and cottages that could fit in this living room. That these families didn’t have to pretend at playing dead, because death was always about, always visiting. Whether in the form of a late-night visit from police officers describing a drunken drive home gone bad, or an emergency room visit after a chainsaw accident working in the woods, or a funeral-home visit because somebody’s dad worked with asbestos at the shipyard for twenty years, death was always around. And it wasn’t a playful companion.

“No,” he said. “It won’t be a problem at all. First, what did you have in mind? How exactly did you want to set this up?”

And Jack brought him right down to earth with a sharp look. “Hey, now,” he said, lowering his arm from his wife’s shoulder. “We’re the ones paying you. That’s the deal, right? If you can’t come up with a good idea or two, then we’ll find someone else. Clear?”

Clay held his hands behind his back as he clenched his fists. He knew Jack’s type. Lived and played in a world where hammering the other guy meant stealing his money. He wondered how long Jack would last in a world where hammering the other guy literally meant dropping him to the ground and going after his ribs and testicles with heavy workboots. He let out a deep breath, relaxed his hands.

“Clear. I have a couple of ideas already. I didn’t know if you had anything particular in mind.”

Chrissy smiled, trying to defuse the tension. “No, we’ll just follow your lead. Pretend we’re your models or something. Okay?”

He nodded. “Sure. Let me set up my gear and we can get started in about ten to fifteen minutes.”

Jack dismissed him with a nod and went into the kitchen with his wife, and once again, Clay felt like the Invisible Man. He bustled around the wide living room, laying out power cables, setting up light stands and flash shields, opening up his tool box so he would have ready access to the spare bulbs, screwdriver, tiny hammer, duct tape, and anything else he needed. While he worked, Jack and Chrissy stood by the counter in the kitchen, both of them now drinking from tall glasses. It was muggy, and Clay felt sweat running down his back, and he looked enviously at the drinks Jack and Chrissy were holding. Not once did they offer him a drink, and not once did he think of asking. He wouldn’t ask. He wouldn’t beg.

All the while he worked, he heard snippets of conversation from the couple.

He: “...want to get this wrapped up so we can get over to the club...”

She: “...but try to stay away from the Morrisons’ daughter, you’re just embarrassing her and infuriating me...”

He: “...if you didn’t drink as much as you did...”

She: “...at least it’s done in private, and at least I don’t paw teenage girls...”

He: “...for the last time, I wasn’t pawing, her neck hurt and I was...”

Clay straightened up, his back aching a bit from bringing in the rest of the gear and from doing the setup work. He cleared his throat and Jack and Chrissy looked over. The Invisible Man was now visible.

“I’m ready to start if you are,” he said, and they came in from the kitchen, leaving their drinks behind. The living room now had a 35 mm camera on a tripod, and two flash arrangements with reflective screens. Power lines snaked across the floor, and for a moment Clay felt good at what he had just done. He probably could have gotten away with half of the equipment and most of the aggravation, but for what he intended to charge these two nitwits when the day was done he wanted to make sure that they at least felt they got their money’s worth.

Jack and Chrissy came out to the living room and Clay went to one of his gear packs, pulled out a Polaroid instant camera. Jack eyed what Clay held in his hand and said, “All this work and you’re going to take our picture with that toy?”

Clay tried not to squeeze the camera too hard. “No, this is just what I use for a sample shot. That way I can make sure everything’s blocked right and that the scene looks good.”

Chrissy said, “Oh, Jack, leave the poor man alone. Look, where do you want us?”

“Sit right on the couch for now, and we’ll take it from there.”

As Clay watched, they both sat down on the couch, the Christmas tree and gifts to the left. He moved the coffee table away so their legs and feet could be visible, and he stepped back and lifted up the camera, and then lowered his arms.

It was all wrong.

Jack said, “What’s up now?”

Clay shook his head. “It doesn’t work.”

“You haven’t taken a single picture and already there’s something wrong?” Jack demanded.

“It’s your clothes,” Clay said.

“And what’s the matter with our clothes?”

He took a breath, held it, let it out. “The problem is, you have a Christmas tree and gifts piled up next to you. It’s supposed to be Christmastime, but you’re both dressed for the summer. I’m sorry, it doesn’t work. If you want to make this look realistic, you’ve got to start with the basics. And the basics are the clothes.”

Chrissy said, “What do you suggest?”

“Something a bit more formal, something that suggests it’s December. Maybe a dress for you and long pants and a shirt for—”

Jack stood up, face red. “Nice thinking, pal. If you’d have thought of this ten minutes ago, we’d already be that much further along.”

Chrissy stood next to her husband, arm quickly around him. “Now, Jack, you know he’s right. C’mon, I know exactly what we’ll wear. I’ve got that silly elf costume I wore two winters ago for that club party, and you can get those dreadful suspenders and tie that Aunt Cecile sent you. C’mon, it’ll be a scream.”

Jack seemed to calm down, but he still shook his head as he headed to the stairs. “All right, but let’s hurry it up. I still don’t want to be late.”

When they’d both gone upstairs Clay walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the lawn and the lake. He let out a breath with a low whoosh and leaned forward until his forehead was up against the glass. He was hot and tired and thirsty and felt like rolling up the sleeves on his shirt. He could hear them upstairs, going through dresser drawers and closets. If he had his druthers, he’d pack up his gear and get out of here before they came down, but he couldn’t. This would be a good-paying job when it was wrapped up, and he had worked too hard and long in setting up this legit business to let his irritation get the best of him. Don’t let this one get away from you. Don’t.

Just an hour or so, he thought. Get through the next hour or so and then we’ll be all done. They’ll be at their overpriced club with their overpriced friends, and we’ll be back at our apartment, music on the stereo, steaks on the grill, and maybe we can invite up that single mom from downstairs, Melissa. Even if he just rented a video and sat on the couch and made some popcorn he was sure he’d have more fun and satisfaction tonight than these two.

A woman’s voice from the stairs: “Ta da!”

He turned. Chrissy Tate was there, all smiles and not much else. She had on a red velvet costume with intricate green embroidery that did make her look like an elf, but only a fantasy elf for some adult Santa. It was short on the legs and had a scoop cut up front, and hugged her quite nicely. A red stocking hat with a white pompom on the end topped off her head, and she had on short high-heeled leather boots and black stockings.

“What do you think?” she asked slyly, walking over to him, the heels tap-tapping on the tile floor.

He found his voice. “It looks... it looks quite nice.”

She dipped, as in a curtsy. It looked like she was carrying two neckties in her left hand. She came closer, lowered her voice. “Tell me, when you’re done, when will you have prints ready for us to look at?”

“Five, six days,” he said.

She smiled, lowered her voice even more. “Then bring them by Friday next. To the house. Jack... he’ll be away on business that day. Okay?”

Oh, my, he thought. He just nodded, and in a desperate attempt to change the subject, “What’s up with the neckties? Your husband couldn’t decide?”

She laughed. “Oh, nothing like that. I figured that instead of just lying on the couch with our eyes closed we could pretend to be strangled or something. It’d make it look more realistic.”

“It sure would,” he said carefully.

Then came the sounds of feet on the stairs and Jack joined them, his face still flushed. Clay looked at him and kept his face neutral. No use pissing off a paying customer. Jack had on polished black shoes, black trousers, white shirt, and wide and loud suspenders that showed Santa Claus, reindeer, Christmas trees, and gift boxes. He also had on a bow tie made from the same pattern.

“All right,” he grumbled. “Let’s get this over with. I tell you, I’m not doing this again next year, even if Blake and Terry send us a Christmas card with the two of them aboard the goddamn space shuttle.”

They sat down and Chrissy looked up at him, handing over the ties. “Why don’t you set us up and tell us what to do.”

He held the soft silk ties in his hands, looked down at the two of them, his mouth quite dry. He wished he had snuck a drink while they were upstairs. “Okay, if you’re going to pretend you’re dead, you’ll have to do it right. Why don’t you both settle in on opposite sides of the couch. All right, like that. Now splay out your legs. You’re not sitting up, sitting nice. No, you’ve got to remember, your body’s not moving, it’s slack. Um, you’re dead. Okay?”

Clay stepped back, looked through the 35 mm camera’s viewfinder. Jack was on the right side of the couch, still looking pretty stiff as he lay back, his legs outstretched. His hands were folded in his lap. That will have to change, he thought. The man’s wife, on the other hand, seemed to be getting into it. Her legs were splayed out wide, showing a lot of black pantyhose, and her arms were stretched out dramatically on the side of the couch, her face looking up at the ceiling, eyes closed.

He went back to the couch and said, “Okay, I’m going to put the neckties around your necks. Tell me when it gets too uncomfortable, all right?”

“Sure, sure,” Jack said, his voice grumbling again. Clay went to the rear of the couch and looped the first necktie around Jack’s neck and made a simple loop knot. He slowly drew it closed and Jack raised a hand, “Okay, that’s fine.” Clay stepped forward and adjusted the tie so that it wouldn’t block the bow tie.

“Raise your head, just a bit,” Clay said. “Now, look up at the ceiling. Good, that looks good.”

He then went over to Chrissy, surprised that his hands were trembling slightly. Must be getting tired, he thought. Plus dehydrated. He looped the necktie around her slim neck and gently pulled it taut. “Is it too tight?”

A slight giggle. “Not tight enough. Don’t worry, I can take it.”

He wiped his hands dry on his jeans and then went back to the camera. He bent down and looked through the viewfinder. Out from the lake came the distant rumble of an approaching thunderstorm. The air was now thick, warm, and still. He blinked his eyes and looked through the viewfinder again. Jack and Chrissy Tate. Playing at dead. Must be nice to have the time and money to waste on such things.

Clay picked up the Polaroid camera. “These will just be some test shots, that’s all. So please don’t move.”

The camera felt good in his hands as he moved about the living room, taking about a half-dozen pictures. With each click-flash-whir, a square of slowly-developing paper was spewed out and he fanned the pictures across the coffee table. He tried not to think of the increasingly oppressive heat, the dryness of his mouth, or the sweat trickling down his arms and back. He just focused on what was in the tiny viewfinder, trying to get the best picture he could.

After a few minutes he said, “All right, folks. Let’s take a look at what we’ve got.”

The Tates got up from the couch, and while Chrissy kept the necktie around her slim neck, Jack made a production of tugging his loose. They clustered around the coffee table and Jack said, “It looks fake.”

Clay agreed. “That’s right. It looks like the two of you are lying on the couch with neckties around your necks.”

“What else can we do?” Chrissy asked, a hint of disappointment in her voice.

“Something bloody,” Jack murmured, looking down at the photos.

“Excuse me?” Clay asked.

He picked up one of the developed prints, let it fall to the table. “C’mon,” Jack said. “If we’re going to waste time doing this, the least we can do is to make it right. We can make it bloody. Make it look like we got shot or something.”

Chrissy spoke up, her voice no longer disappointed. “See, I told you that you’d get into it, Jack. We can use some fake blood, like food coloring, and those toy guns.”

Clay spoke up. “Guns?”

“Yeah, we have a couple of nephews who come up and raise hell every now and then. We have a couple of .38 revolvers that are cap guns but look pretty realistic.”

Guns, he thought. Now we’re playing with toy guns. I’ve got to get this wrapped up and finished. This couple is driving me nuts.

Aloud he said, “That sounds like a good idea. Do you have an old sheet you could put over the couch?”

“Sure we do,” she said, heading to the kitchen. “But first, let me get the red food coloring.”

Clay went back to his camera gear and then scooped up the prints as Chrissy came out of the kitchen and headed to the stairs leading up to the second floor. “I’ll be back in a couple of minutes!”

Jack nodded and stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, arms folded. Far up the lake the sky was darker and there was the low grumbling of thunder. “Looks like rain,” he said.

Clay made himself busy by wiping down one of his camera lenses. He was surprised when the man turned and said, “You feel like a beer or something?”

That was the best thing he had heard all day. “Yeah, a beer would be great.”

In a minute they were in the large kitchen and Jack opened the stainless-steel door of the refrigerator, which looked like it had enough food to last the summer. He pulled out two Sam Adams and Clay greedily drank almost half of his in one long, delicious swallow. Maybe the day was improving after all. Maybe.

Jack leaned back against the large refrigerator. “You been doing photo work for long?”

“A couple of years.”

“Do you like it?”

A shrug. “Most times. Usually it’s pretty straightforward stuff. Weddings. Family portraits. Class reunions.”

Jack took a swallow of his beer. “I’d guess today’s not pretty straightforward, am I right?” And Jack grinned, like he knew exactly what Clay was thinking.

Clay smiled back. The day was definitely improving. And to show his appreciation, he’d boost the final bill another ten percent.

“Yeah, I must admit, seeing a Christmas tree set up in June gave me a start there for a second.”

Another wide smile. “That’s Chrissy for you. She’s a good girl, a guy couldn’t ask for anything better. But when she gets her mind set on something, watch out. She really wanted a Christmas card this year to stand out, and I figure to go along. Why the hell not? Makes her happy and keeps her quiet. Jesus, it sure is hot, isn’t it? Air conditioning on this floor isn’t worth shit.”

Then, maybe a bit loopy on the beer and easy conversation, Clay made a mistake, and knew it the minute he did. It was hot, damn it, and he rolled up the sleeves on his black turtleneck shirt.

Jack spotted it instantly. “Man, those are interesting tattoos.”

Idiot, he fumed quietly. Why the hell did you go and do that?

Clay kept his voice neutral. “One of these days I’ll save up enough and have them burned off. They use lasers nowadays.”

“Hmmm,” Jack said, eyeing his forearms. “Bleeding skulls, daggers, and a rattlesnake. Pretty interesting.”

Clay said nothing.

“Friend of mine, he’s a cop down in Manchester,” Jack said, his voice now inquisitive. “Said tattoos like that, ones that are blue-black and blurry around the edges, you can only get them in one place. Prison.”

Clay took a small swig of the beer. “Really?”

Jack nodded. “Unh-hunh. So tell me, did you get those while you were in jail?”

Clay stared at the man’s eyes, seeing a flinty hardness, the inquisition coming right at him. So, Jack was no doubt thinking, who are you and why are you in my house?

Clay tried to smile. “Yeah, long time ago. When I was young and dumb.”

There, he thought. That was an easy lie.

Jack now looked fascinated. “Really? What for?”

Quick, it was now time for lie number two. “Stupid stuff. I got drunk in a bar and some guy was coming on to my girlfriend. I didn’t like it and we started fighting. Problem was, I got pretty rough with him and I had a juvenile record for stealing a couple of cars, so I got extra time tagged on. But I did my sentence and I’ve been clean ever since.”

Sure, the voice inside him said. Clean and uncaught.

“That’s wild,” Jack said. “Prison. Man, that must have been something.”

“Yeah,” Clay agreed. “It was something.”

A voice from the living room. “Fellas, come on back, I’ve got the stuff.”

He followed Jack out into the room, where Chrissy had spread a white sheet over the couch. A tube of red food coloring and two toy guns were on the coffee table. The guns were black plastic and did look real. Jack spoke up as he stepped over to his wife. “You want to hear something, something interesting?”

“Sure,” his wife said.

Jack gestured to Clay, and Clay wished he had never come here. “Our photographer here. He’s actually done prison time. Can you believe that? An ex-con, in our house. Wait till I tell the people at the club tonight who we had in our house.”

Chrissy looked at Clay, straight on, and just smiled. It didn’t look like the thought bothered her at all. “Was it hard, being in prison?”

He looked away, picked up the food-coloring tube. “Yeah, it was hard. Look, I don’t want to waste any more of your time. Let’s get this going.”

Jack and Chrissy pulled the white sheet taut against the couch and sat down. The room was darker, as the storm clouds from the other end of the lake had headed in the direction of the house. There was another low rumble of thunder. Clay handed over the toy revolvers, conscious of the bare feeling of having his turtleneck sleeves rolled up.

“Hold the guns in your hand, but limp-like,” he said. “Remember, you’re dead. Okay, now lean back, let your bodies rest. Lean your heads back, as well.”

Chrissy spoke up, her eyes closed. “So, what’s it going to look like? Something like the two of us shooting each other at the same time?”

Jack laughed sharply. “Yeah, you wish,” and Clay noticed that his voice was now slightly slurred. That beer back in the kitchen certainly hadn’t been his first drink of the day.

“Sure, something like that,” Clay said. “I’m going to use the food coloring now.”

He picked up the food-coloring tube and just looked at the scene for a moment, running possibilities through his mind. Chrissy on the left, Jack on the right. Bodies look okay, toy revolvers are visible. Only thing left to do is to make them look dead. The room lit up as a flash of lightning struck somewhere out on the lake. The low rumble of the thunder made a couple of the knickknacks on the shelves tremble.

Go on, he thought. Another half-hour and we’ll be done, and this bill will be so high, it’ll make their eyes pop out.

“Here’s what I’m thinking,” he said. “Jack, I’ll put some food coloring on your forehead, to make it look like you got shot there. I’ll also spray some on the sheet behind you, so that it’s more realistic, like the bullet went out the back of your head. Chrissy, I’ll try the front of your dress, but it’s so dark I’m not sure—”

“My chest,” she said, interrupting. “Just below my throat, put some on my skin. I don’t mind. I’m not shy.”

Another slurred comment from Jack. “Yeah, she sure as hell ain’t shy. The Fourth of July pool party, where you took off—”

“Shut up,” she said sharply, and Clay noticed how Jack swallowed and his face turned red.

“Okay,” he said. “Head and chest wounds.”

He did Jack first, dribbling some of the red food coloring on his forehead. With his head leaning back, it looked impressive, though the color was all wrong. Not ruddy enough. Clay then squeezed some of the food coloring onto his fingers and snapped it on the sheet, making a spray pattern. Idiots, he thought. You’d think they’d wonder how and why he knew so much about wounds.

Now, Chrissy’s turn. He noticed the slight smile on her face, the way her neck was quivering. Just below her throat and above the swell of her exposed cleavage, he made two dribbles of the red food coloring on her skin. She seemed startled for a moment at the sensation, and then eased back and smiled wider.

“Guess I’ll be ready for a nice long shower when this is over,” she murmured.

Clay didn’t say anything in reply.

Back at his camera gear, he picked up the Polaroid again for some test shots. Again, the reassuring click-flash-whir. “How’s it going?” she asked.

“In just a minute, I’ll show you. But don’t get up from the couch. If you decide that they’re good enough, I’ll switch right over to the thirty-five millimeter.”

He held the pieces of developing paper in his hand, and after they had focused into sharpness, he went over to the couch. “Here you go,” he said, handing them to Jack and Chrissy.

Then it went wrong, very quickly.

Jack sat up and exploded, tossing the photos across the floor. “Are you kidding me? Showing us those pieces of crap? They look worse than the other ones! It looks like we’re dressed up for Halloween, never goddamn mind Christmas! It doesn’t look real at all!”

“Jack, listen to—” his wife started, her eyes wide and open, but he wouldn’t let her speak.

“No, you listen, you stupid witch! You’ve made us waste half a day sitting around for this stupid idea of yours, and for what? So this nitwit you found in the phone book, some guy fresh out of prison, can cheat us with a bill when we’re through?”

Clay felt his knees begin to tremble with nervous energy. “Mr. Tate, I don’t cheat anyone. That’s not how I do my business.”

Tate laughed again, face quite red. “Man, I deal every day with guys a hell of a lot sharper than you, minute by minute. I could smell you a mile away. Thought you could razzle-dazzle us with all this photo-gear crap and then get enough cash to buy a boat or some damn thing. Well, it’s not going to work! Clean up your trash and get out of my house!”

Chrissy tried again, but it was Clay who interrupted. “I have a deal for you.”

There. The man looked interested. “You do? What kind of deal?”

The only type you’ll understand, he thought. Clay looked around the room. “Here’s what I’m offering. I’ve got another idea of how to make this work. If that happens, and you agree, then I’ll charge you just materials. No labor. And if the idea doesn’t work, then I’ll leave, free and clear, and you won’t owe me a thing.”

“How long?” Jack demanded.

“Just a few minutes,” he said.

Chrissy said, “It sounds reasonable, Jack. You know it does.”

Her husband made a show of settling back down on the couch, not quite hiding the triumph in his eyes. “You want it to sound reasonable so you’re not embarrassed. That’s why. Okay, photo man. Go ahead. You’ve got five minutes.”

Clay stepped away from the couch, headed back over to his photo gear. “Five minutes it is,” he said. “Just lie back and keep your eyes closed.”

Chrissy then said something low and sharp to her husband, and he replied, and she said, “Hunh, we’ll see about that!”

Clay squatted down on the floor, let his fingers rummage through his toolbox. Another flare of light as the thunderstorm approached. He had tried. Honest he had, from setting up the legit business to going on the straight and narrow, never letting anything get away from him.

But they had pushed and prodded him, right from the moment he had arrived. They had asked him. Customer’s choice, he thought. Not my fault.

There. He found what he was looking for. He stood up.

“Here I come,” he said, and as he walked over to them he held the hunting knife close to his thigh, letting a thumb lovingly and caressingly go over the sharp blade.