Pale Kings and Princes

29

Susan came back from seeing Caroline Rogers. She came into the bar, where Hawk and I were being served in silence by Virgie. Hawk and I were drinking beer.

“Asked for champagne,” Hawk said to Susan. “They gave me Korbel.”

“Frontier living,” Susan said. Hawk slid down a stool along the bar, and Susan sat between us. Virgie came down the nearly empty bar and looked at her.

“Margarita,” Susan said, “on the rocks, salt.”

“What do you think,” I said.

“I talked with Wagner. He’s all right. He’s not awfully sophisticated about emotions, but he knows it and is glad for the help.”

“How about Caroline,” I said.

“She’s home,” Susan said. “Wagner released her while I was there and we took her home. She’s going to take tranquilizers for about three months and then we’ll slowly reduce the dosage.”

“Otherwise you get cardiac problems,” Hawk said.

Susan and I both looked at Hawk for a moment.

“That’s right,” Susan said.

Hawk smiled.

“You look like a scary Mona Lisa when you do that,” Susan said.

Hawk’s smile broadened.

“How’d Caroline feel about you,” I said.

“Ambivalent,” Susan said. “She’s suspicious of shrinks. She’d rather you had been there.”

“Un huh.”

“She is under the impression that you can leap tall buildings at a single bound.”

“Well,” I said, “not really tall buildings.”

“But whoever she’d prefer,” Susan said, “she knows she needs help with this, and she seems to believe, at least partially, that help is possible.”

“That’s encouraging,” I said.

“Yes, it is,” Susan said. “Hopelessness is hard.”

“Did you make any arrangements?” I said.

“I’ll see her tomorrow. Then we’ll see. I don’t normally do house calls. I don’t know if she’ll want to drive forty miles each way, twice a week, to see me.”

“You could refer her,” I said.

“Yes, for the long term. For the short term she’s suicidal and you can probably help her as much as I can.”

“By doing what?” I said.

“By being there. By seeing her. By telling her she can count on you. She’s fastened on you in the middle of a time when everything has collapsed.”

“Hell, I’m part of what caused the collapse,” I said.

“Don’t matter,” Hawk said.

“That’s right,” Susan said. “It doesn’t. It’s a little like the baby geese that, new hatched, imprint on their keeper and act as though he were their mother. When tragedies like this hit people, they are nearly destroyed, the old order has, at least symbolically, died.”

“Or actually died, in this case,” I said.

“Yes. So that Caroline is, as it were, new hatched.”

“And she imprinted on you, babe,” Hawk said.

“Only because you weren’t around, Mona.”

“Likely,” Hawk said.

“It’s more than grief,” Susan said.

“What else?” I said

“There’s guilt,” Susan said.

“About what?”

“I don’t know yet, I barely know there’s a guilt. But it’s there.”

“Lot of people feel guilty when someone they’re close to dies,” I said. “The better-him-than-me syndrome. The if-only-I’d-been-nice-to-him-slash-her syndrome.”

“The what-am-I-going-to-do-for-money-slash-sex syndrome,” Hawk said.

“Maybe any, maybe all of those,” Susan said. “But she’s already idealizing her husband. She’s not idealizing her son.”

“Which means?”

“I don’t know what it means. I know that it suggests a variation from the usual patterns of grief that I see.”

“It’s atypical,” I said.

“Yes,” Susan said. “It’s atypical. Psychology is not practiced with the innards of birds. If you have experience and you’ve seen a lot of people in extremis, you see patterns. And then you see anyone in extremis whose behavior is different from the ones you’ve been seeing, and you say, in technical language, hoo ha!”

“And Caroline is different.”

“Yes. If I were talking to a colleague I would never be this bold. I would say perhaps more often, and inappropriate, and further examination may reveal, but to you I say, there’s guilt.”

“Because I’m not your colleague,” I said.

“That’s right,” Susan said. “You are my sweet patootie.”

A short round-faced guy in a navy pea coat and jeans came into the bar and walked toward us.

“Spenser?” he said.

“Yes.”

“My name’s Conway. I’m the cop that was in the reception room at Wheaton Union Hospital the day you were there.”

“When I was inquiring about a shooting.”

“Yeah.”

“You seemed to feel there was no shooting,” I said.

“Yeah. Can we talk?”

“Right here is fine,” I said.

“This is private.”

“All for one,” I said, “and one for all. Here is good.”

Conway took a breath and looked at Virgie. She was down at the far end of the bar.

He lowered his voice. “You’re playing against a house deck,” he said.

I nodded.

“Cops ain’t on your side,” he said.

“The Wheaton cops.”

“Yeah. They’re Esteva’s.”

“I sort of figured that,” I said.

“They’re going to show up here in a while and search your room and find some cocaine.”

“Which they’ll bring,” I said.

“We think you maybe got some there,” Conway said, “but if you don’t they’ll find it anyway.”

“And arrest me.”

“Conspiracy to distribute.”

“They got a warrant?” I said.

“They can have one if they want to,” Conway said. “You don’t understand about this town. It’s Esteva’s. He owns all of it.”

“Did he own Bailey?” I said.

“I don’t know,” Conway said.

“How come you’re blowing the whistle,” Hawk said.

Conway shook his head. “I ain’t. I grew up with these guys. I known them all my life. But I can’t be part of it anymore.”

“Which was it,” I said. “Bailey or the kid?”

“Both,” Conway said. “After Bailey went down I decided to get out. Then the kid got killed. Seventeen-year-old kid.” He shook his head.

“You won’t talk to the state cops?”

“No. I’m talking to you because I don’t want no more killings on my head.”

“You figure we’d be killed resisting arrest?”

“Sooner or later,” he said. “They gotta find the coke ’fore you die, but once they get you in they ain’t gonna let you out. None of you.” He looked at Susan.

“So what are you going to do,” I said.

“I’m outa here,” Conway said. “I’m single. Got the dog in the car outside. Got a thousand bucks I saved. I’m going to California.”

“Still want to be a cop?”

“Yeah. I like it, or I used to. Then the money started getting so easy, and blowing the whistle on your buddies... I couldn’t.”

“There’s a homicide cop in Los Angeles, a lieutenant named Samuelson,” I said. “If you go there and look him up he might be able to help. Tell him I sent you.”

“Samuelson,” Conway said. “I’ll remember. Thanks.”

“How about the guy I shot on the road that night?” I said.

“Chuckie,” he said. “He’s okay. Didn’t hit the bone.”

“Who recruited them?” I said.

“Esteva. Chuckie and his brother both done a little time. Used to do low-level stuff like that for Esteva.”

“I’m low-level stuff?”

“We thought so,” Conway said.

“Anything else you can tell us,” I said.

“No, I’m outa here,” he said. “I should be gone now.”

“Thank you,” Susan said.

“Yeah,” I said. Hawk nodded. For Hawk that was bathetic gratitude.

“Samuelson,” Conway said. “I’ll remember.”

“Luck,” I said.

“You too,” Conway said, and turned and walked away.

“What do we do,” Susan said.

“I think maybe we get you back home,” Hawk said.

“No,” she said. “I came out here to help and I will.”

I nodded. Hawk grinned. “Spenser ain’t the only one stubborn,” he said.

“But it doesn’t mean I wish to sit here and be arrested,” Susan said.

“No,” I said. “Let’s repair to the Jaguar and cruise around and think.”

“Two things at the same time,” Hawk said. He put a twenty on the bar and we walked out.