Low Pressure

Chapter 8

Rupe Collier checked his reflection in the full-length mirror on the back of his office door. He patted his thinning hair into place to help cover the ever-widening bald spot on the crown of his head, shot his cuffs to make certain the diamonds in his Texas-shaped gold cuff links were twinkling, smiled widely to check his capped teeth for stuck food, then, approving of what he saw, left his office.

He strode into the showroom, where strategically placed spotlights shone on the new models fresh from the factory. He didn’t ordinarily work the floor, but one of his salesman had told him that a customer was insistent on dealing with the “main man,” and Rupe was definitely that.

The customer, pointed out to Rupe by the salesman, was bent down, peering through the tinted glass window—an option available at extra cost—into the luxurious interior of a top-of-the-line sedan.

“Rupe Collier. Who do I have the pleasure of meeting?”

The customer straightened up and returned Rupe’s smile as he shook the extended hand. Rupe was pleased to see that his cuff links didn’t escape notice. The other man wasn’t dressed or groomed nearly as well, and that was the way Rupe liked it. It gave him a distinct advantage when it came to bargaining. In order to be a winner, one had to look the part.

The car shopper dropped Rupe’s hand and motioned toward the car. “How much would this baby set me back?”

“It’s worth every penny of the sticker price, but I can cut you the best deal in the country.”

“Thirty-day guarantee?”

“On any car on the lot. I stand behind my product.”

“Continuing the customer-service policies that your daddy built the business on forty years ago.”

Rupe’s grin widened. “You’re well informed.”

“Your commercials run nonstop on TV.”

“I believe in advertising, in putting yourself out there.” Rupe lightly slugged the man in the shoulder.

“So do I, Mr. Collier. We think alike.”

“Call me Rupe.”

“Pleased to meet you, Rupe. My name’s Rocky Van Durbin.”

Rupe’s stomach plummeted.

The tabloid columnist fished a business card from the breast pocket of his off-the-rack sport jacket and handed it over. Having recognized the man’s name instantly, Rupe realized he’d been cleverly ambushed. But he decided to brazen it out and pretended to read the card.

“New York City? We don’t get many shoppers from way up there. I’m honored.” He pocketed the card with as much nonchalance as he could fake. “If you’re seriously in the market for a new car, Mr. Van Durbin, you couldn’t do better than—”

“No thanks. I’m just looking.”

“Sure, sure,” Rupe said expansively. “Stay for as long as you like. Bob there, who you met out on the lot, will be happy to answer your questions and help you any way he can. But you’ll have to excuse me. Unfortunately, I’m late for an appointment.”

Van Durbin laughed. “I get that a lot.” Then he squinted his ferret eyes. “By people who’re afraid to talk to me.”

He’d practically called Rupe Collier a coward, and Rupe didn’t take the insult lightly. He felt like taking the slimy columnist by his scrawny neck and shaking him till his brains rattled. But he didn’t practice his smile in the mirror every morning for nothing. He managed to keep it intact.

“I enjoy chatting with anybody from the Big Apple. But I’m expected somewhere else soon. Let’s make an appointment—”

Van Durbin cut him off. “Well, see, that’s a problem, Rupe. Because, soon, I gotta be somewhere else, too. Besides…” He socked Rupe in the shoulder as Rupe had done to him. “You practically wrote the book on closing the sale. Long as I’m here? Just a few minutes of your time? How ’bout it?”

Rupe’s smile was growing stiff from keeping it in place. “Why don’t we talk in my office?”

“Great! Thanks.”

Rupe led the way, and, although he maintained his easy-breezy gait to keep up appearances, mostly for Van Durbin himself, he was anything but relaxed.

His unwanted visitor whistled softly when he stepped into Rupe’s inner sanctum. “Niiiiice. The car business must be good.”

“Can’t complain.”

“My mother, rest her soul, tried to tell me I’d chosen the wrong career path. ‘You can’t make money in journalism.’ She must’ve told me that a thousand times. I reminded her that Hearst had made some serious coin. Murdoch. But”—he sighed—“Mom was right. They were exceptions.”

Trying not to appear overanxious, Rupe said, “How can I help you, Mr. Van Durbin?”

Van Durbin’s attention had already been snagged by the copy of Low Pressure lying on the desk. Rupe gritted his teeth in frustration. He should have gotten rid of the damn thing after he’d read it. At the very least, he shouldn’t have left it in plain sight.

Van Durbin moseyed over to it now and picked it up, then made a production of fanning through the four-hundred-and-something pages. “Now this local gal has done all right in the writing game, hasn’t she? She’s making a killing off this book.”

Rupe was a natural showman, and he had used those innate showmanship skills to full advantage his entire life. He hoped they didn’t fail him now. He moved around the corner of his desk and sat down in his cowhide chair, motioning for Van Durbin to sit in the chair facing him.

“I have a hunch that you didn’t come all the way from New York to talk cars. That book brought you here. I’ll take it a step further and venture that you know I prosecuted the murder case of Susan Lyston, and that’s what you want to talk to me about.”

Van Durbin spread his arms away from his sides. “You caught me red-handed. Can I ask you some questions about your case against Allen Strickland? I’m addressing that aspect of the story in my column tomorrow.”

Bile filled the back of Rupe’s throat, but he tried to appear unflappable. “It was a long time ago. I’ll stretch my memory as best I can.”

“Thanks, Rupe.” Van Durbin produced a small spiral notebook and a yellow pencil dimpled with a disgusting number of teeth marks. “Don’t mind this. I have to write things down or I forget.”

Rupe doubted that. He doubted the bastard ever forgot anything. He was sly, and he was dangerous. Rupe considered calling the dealership’s security guard and having Van Durbin removed from the premises. But then it would appear that he had something to hide. He would also lose all control over what Van Durbin wrote about him.

No, better to stick to the playacting, cooperate, and give the writer something, in the hope that Rupert Collier would be depicted favorably in his column. He began by telling Van Durbin what a fan he was of the media. “You could call me a news junkie. So I’m happy to answer any questions I can. Fire away.”

“Good, good. Let’s start with why you left the DA’s office.”

“That one’s easy. Selling cars pays better. A hell of a lot better. I wouldn’t have an office near this niiiiice at the courthouse.”

Van Durbin chuckled. “You decided that you’d just as well reap the benefits of your daddy’s labor.”

Rupe recognized that for the well-placed dig it was, but he gave a good-natured thumbs-up. “Daddy didn’t raise no stupid children.”

“Right. You would have been a sap to stay in public service.”

That was one of those trick questions, which wasn’t really a question but a statement. Rupe was savvy enough to see the trap. “I serve my community in other ways now.”

“Oh, I’m sure you do.” Van Durbin flashed him an obnoxious grin. “But back then, you were committed to ‘sweeping Travis County’s streets free of the criminal element.’ I cheated. I read that quote somewhere.”

“I performed my job to the best of my ability.”

Van Durbin flipped back several pages of his notepad and read some of the scribbles. “Uh, I jotted down just a coupla things I wanted to ask you about. Oh, here. Was Ms. Price’s book accurate? Strickland was convicted of manslaughter? Not murder?”

“That’s right.”

“Why not murder?”

“I determined that his crime wasn’t premeditated.”

“In other words, he didn’t plan on killing her. She did something that set him off and wound up dying over it.”

Another carefully laid booby trap. “Mr. Van Durbin, surely you’re not suggesting that she ‘asked for it.’”

“No, no, I’d never even imply that.” But his wicked grin belied the denial. “Strickland flew off the handle, killed her in a fit of passion, something like that?”

“If you want a clarification of the difference between the charges of murder and manslaughter, you can go online and access the Texas penal code.”

“Thanks, I might do that. Just so I’m clear in my own mind.” He tapped his temple with the eraser of his pencil. “You and that homicide detective… what was his name?”

“Gosh… who worked that case?” Rupe screwed up his face as though searching his memory. “I can’t remember offhand. I was an ADA, working my patooty off, seventy, eighty hours a week. I was getting thrown cases right and left. A lot of felony cases. Worked with a number of cops, a slew of detectives.”

Van Durbin snapped his fingers. “Moody. Dale Moody.”

What Rupe was thinking was Shitshitshit!, but what he said was, “I think you’re right. I think it was Moody.”

“It was. My research assistant verified it and has been trying to run him down. She’s checked with the Austin PD, but he’s retired and they wouldn’t give her any information on him. He doesn’t have an Austin address. His name’s not on the county tax rolls. You wouldn’t by any chance know where I could find him, would you?”

“Until a few seconds ago, I couldn’t even recall his name.”

“That’s a no, then?”

“That’s a ‘Sorry I wish I could help you, but I can’t.’”

Van Durbin scratched something in his notepad. “So I guess if I wanted to ask him about his investigation and Strickland’s trial, I’d be out of luck.”

“I guess you would.”

Van Durbin propped his ankle on his opposite knee and jiggled his foot. “Unless you wanted to open up to me about it. Talk me through it yourself.”

Rupe gestured down at the book. “Ms. Price thoroughly covered it.”

Van Durbin frowned. “But did it seem to you…? This just might be me, understand. But it seemed to me that she left the ending open to interpretation. Did it seem that way to you?”

Rupe forced his expression to turn thoughtful for a moment, then shook his head. “No, I can’t say that it did.”

“Hmm.” Van Durbin skimmed over everything he’d written down before flipping the notepad closed. He replaced it along with the pencil in his shirt pocket and stood up. “Well, I guess that’s everything. I can’t thank you enough for giving me a few minutes of your valuable time.”

“You’re welcome. Although I don’t feel like I contributed much.” Smile in place, Rupe went to the door and pulled it open.

Van Durbin was almost across the threshold when he stopped, turned, and tapped Rupe’s silk necktie with his index finger. “If I were you, Rupe, you know what would eat at me?”

It took all Rupe’s self-control not to brush away that finger, with its loose cuticle and the fingernail chewed down to the quick. “What’s that?”

“It would eat at me that the murder weapon never turned up. You and Moody determined that she was choked to death with her underwear, right?”

Rupe gave a noncommital nod.

“But the panties never turned up, did they? And you looked every-damn-where for them.”

“Obviously the jury didn’t think having them in evidence was necessary to convict.”

“Obviously,” Van Durbin said, frowning. “But I hate loose ends like that, don’t you, Rupe?”

The topic of Susan’s underpants seemed to have raised the temperature in Bellamy’s kitchen. Introducing that vital element into their discussion of the crime had been inevitable, but now Dent wished he’d let Bellamy bring it up first.

Too ill at ease to sit any longer in a tense silence, he got up from the table and took another aimless tour of the kitchen until his attention was drawn to a ceramic jug on the counter that contained a variety of stainless-steel doodads.

Pulling one out, he held it up and twirled it between his fingers. “What does this do?”

“It cores apples.”

“You don’t just eat around the core?”

But, not to be distracted, she asked, “Was your house searched?”

He returned the apple corer to the jug. “If by searched you mean turned inside out, then yeah. It was searched. Moody and an army of cops showed up with a warrant to look specifically for a pair of Susan’s underwear.

“They ransacked the place. Even confiscated my motorcycle. They took it apart piece by piece. I had it reassembled, but it was never the same, and I wound up having to get rid of it.”

He looked over at Bellamy, who appeared to be hanging on every word, but she said nothing, so he continued.

“That pair of panties was the Holy Grail of Moody’s investigation. His thinking was that the man who was caught with them was the deviant who’d used them to strangle her.”

She stared thoughtfully into near space. “Of all the indignities, the cruelties, that Olivia and Daddy were subjected to over Susan’s death, I believe that aspect of it was the hardest for them. It was certainly the most embarrassing. It implied any variety of dreadful things. Either she’d been molested or…”

“Or,” he stressed, “she’d willingly let the man remove them. Or she had taken them off herself. Which I’m inclined to believe.”

“Why?”

He stopped pacing and gave her a meaningful look. “The first time we went out.” She dropped her gaze to the tabletop.

“Also, there wasn’t any other indication of sexual assault,” he continued. “She wasn’t bruised or torn down there. No bite marks. No semen. Whatever took place before she was killed was consensual. Even Moody thought so.”

“Nevertheless, the missing underpants added a salacious element to the crime and made it all the more horrible.”

“And yet…” Placing his hands flat on the table, he leaned down close to her and said in a whispery voice, “The girl in your novel is choked to death in the same manner.”

“Because that’s what happened.”

“But doesn’t it spice things up, which equates to selling more books?”

Her eyes flashed with anger. “Go to hell.”

“I’ve been,” he fired back.

She stood up so abruptly that her chair went over backward, making a slamming sound against the floor that reverberated and shocked them both into silence.

She turned to pick up the chair, but Dent stepped around the table and set it upright before she could. He’d made her temper flare. He was intentionally goading her, and he didn’t know why, but he knew he didn’t like himself for it. He’d begun to notice how weary she looked. Given her father’s condition, and the state of her house upon her return from Houston, he doubted she’d slept much last night. The violet half-moons beneath her eyes indicated that she hadn’t slept well for quite some time.

On impulse, he said, “Want to get some air?”

She looked at him quizzically.

“Outside. Fresh air. Let’s go for a walk.”

She went to the window, moved aside the curtain, and looked up at the sky. “It’s overcast.”

“It’s hazy.”

“It’s muggy.”

“The climate is worse in here.”

He took her arm and propelled her out the back door, giving her little choice. Once on the sidewalk, they fell into step companionably. She even took a deep breath of contentment.

“See?” he said. “We needed to get out of there for a while. It was getting intense.”

“We rub each other the wrong way.”

Looking at her askance, he said, “We could rub each other till we get it right.” He watched for her blush and wasn’t disappointed. She’d needed that extra color in her cheeks. It flattered her. “I’ll let you go first,” he offered teasingly. “Unless you want me to. Which I’m happy to do.”

She rolled her eyes. “There’s a park a few blocks up.”

Five minutes later, they were seated in side-by-side swings with old-fashioned wood plank seats and heavy suspension chains. They were the only people near the swings. Some distance away, a middle-aged couple played catch with their young grandson. “Throw the ball to Paw-Paw,” he heard the woman say.

Farther away still, a quartet of teenaged girls in skimpy shorts and tank tops practiced cheerleading. Nearest him and Bellamy a pair of lovers lay on a blanket beneath a shade tree, lost in each other.

Dent moved his swing sideways to bump lightly into hers. “I’ve talked you through my experiences of that day and what came after. But you stopped at the point where Susan returned to the pavilion from the boathouse and started dirty dancing with Allen Strickland.”

She gave her swing a push. “What do you want to know?”

“Did you actually see Susan leave the pavilion with him?”

“Yes.”

“Did you follow them?”

“No.”

“Okay…” He drew out the word in the form of a lead-in.

She continued swinging, going a little higher on each arc. “Okay, what?”

“What did you do?”

She started to speak several times before words actually formed. “I headed for the boathouse.”

“Why the boathouse?”

“I… I think I went to find Steven.”

“You think you went to find him?”

The swing made several pendulous cycles before she said, “The sky was getting darker. I’d seen Steven walking toward the lake and wanted to make certain that he was aware of the approaching storm. I thought he should come back to the pavilion.”

“But neither of you made it back to the pavilion in time. The funnel dipped out of the cloud, you both got caught at the boathouse and had to take cover there.”

She nodded.

“What about Susan?”

She turned her head toward him as the swing sailed past. “What about her?”

“You weren’t worried about her, too?”

“Of course I was.”

“But you didn’t chase after her.”

“She was with Allen.”

“All the more reason to check on her.”

“Maybe I did. I—”

“You said you went to find Steven.”

“Yes, yes, just like in the book.”

“Forget the friggin’ book.”

He set his swing to rocking crazily when he quickly abandoned it. He stepped in front of Bellamy’s swing and grabbed hold of the chains, bringing it to an abrupt halt and wedging his thigh between hers to hold the seat high off the ground.

“What are you doing?”

“More to the point, what are you?” he asked. “This makes twice today that you’ve stalled there. Why? How come your memory is so detailed about what you wore and shoulder straps that kept slipping down, but you go all vague and sputtery when recounting what you did and where you were between the time you saw Susan return from her drinking binge at the boathouse, to when they dragged you from beneath the collapsed roof of it?”

She gazed back at him, wide-eyed and apprehensive. “I testified at Allen Strickland’s trial that I went in search of Steven. I was in the boathouse when the tornado struck. I wasn’t that badly hurt, but I was traumatized by fear, in shock. That’s why I was one of the last people to be accounted for, hours after the storm, even after Susan’s body had been recovered. I heard people—my own parents—frantically calling my name, but I couldn’t respond. I was literally frozen from fear.”

“That follows what you wrote in your book.”

She bobbed her head once.

“So why don’t I believe you?”

Her chin went up a fraction. “Believe me or not, that’s your problem.”

“You’re damn right it is. I’ve got somebody trashing my airplane all because of you and the can of worms you opened. And this is a big, fat, juicy, squiggly one. You falter every time I ask whether or not you followed Susan and Allen Strickland.”

“I didn’t.”

“You’re sure?”

“No. I mean—Yes, I’m sure. No I didn’t follow them. You confused me before and you’re trying to now. When I left the pavilion I ran toward the boathouse.”

“Okay, so why did you choose to warn Steven of the storm, and not your sister?”

“I didn’t make any such choice,” she exclaimed.

“But you did, Bellamy. You just said so. You went toward the boathouse because you’d seen Steven going in that direction.”

“That’s right.”

“Is it?”

She wiggled forward on the seat of the swing, trying to reach the ground with her toes. “Let me down.”

Instead, he moved in closer, using his body to hold her in the swing and the swing off the ground. “Did you find Steven? Were you able to warn him to seek shelter?”

“No.”

“You’re sure of that?”

“Of course I’m sure. That’s why I was alone when they found me in the rubble.”

“You didn’t go after Susan? You didn’t see her after she left the pavilion?”

“No and no.”

“Did you also testify to that under oath?”

“I didn’t have to.”

“Because?”

“Because no one ever asked me. Until now,” she said with vexation.

“So if you didn’t swear otherwise, you might’ve followed her and Allen into the woods.”

“But I didn’t.”

“No?”

She set her chin stubbornly and refused to answer.

He joggled the chains of the swing. “A.k.a?” he said in a singsong voice. “Cat got your tongue?”

“Why are you bullying me about this?”

“I’m only trying to get to the absolute truth.”

“I’ve told you the absolute truth.”

“You didn’t chase after Susan.”

“No.”

“I’m not convinced.”

“Too bad.”

“Why does this point trip you up?”

“It doesn’t.”

“Yeah. It does. How come? There’s gotta be a reason.”

“Let me down, Dent.”

“Did you run after Susan?”

“No.”

“You didn’t?”

“No!”

“Bellamy?”

“I don’t know!”

She gasped in stunned surprise at her own admission, and for several seconds they stayed frozen, their faces inches apart, staring into each other’s eyes. Then her head dropped forward and she repeated miserably, “I don’t know. And that’s the absolute truth.”

He’d pressured her for clarification, but hadn’t really expected it to be this consequential. If he had it to do over again, he might have relented sooner. As it was, he needed to get a grasp of the worrisome implications.

He pried his fingers from around the chain and, with that hand, tipped her head up. Tears were sliding over the freckles on her cheekbones. Her eyes were wet, deeply troubled, haunted.

“I can’t remember,” she said hoarsely. “I’ve tried, God knows. For eighteen years I’ve tried to bridge the gap. But that span of time is blocked out in my memory.”

“Specifically, what do you remember?”

“Specifically? I remember going down to the boathouse and seeing Susan drinking with her friends. Specifically, I remember her coming back, dancing with Allen Strickland, and making a spectacle of herself. I remember watching them leave the pavilion together.”

She looked at him and said helplessly, “But it’s like… like the broken center line on the highway. Sections of time are missing where I don’t remember what I did, or what I saw.”

She hiccuped a soft sob. “Yesterday I told you that I wrote the book so I’d be able to throw it away and forget it. But that was a lie. I wrote it in the hope of remembering.

“And what I think… what I’m afraid of… is that someone read the book, and knows what I left out. He knows whatever it is that I can’t remember. And he doesn’t want me to.”