Save The Last Dance For Me

Thirteen

I went home and took a very cold shower. I stood in there fifteen minutes trying to get snake off me. Part of it was psychological, of course. You couldn’t scrub away a sense of snake. It stayed with you for a long, long time.

I’d just finished getting into some clean summer-weight clothes-white short-sleeved shirt, blue-on-blue striped necktie, blue slacks, black socks, black loafers-when the phone rang.

“You’re going to think I’m crazy.”

“He called and said that he still loved you.”

“Yeah, sort of, anyway.”

“So you’re going to see him.”

“Tonight. That’s why I called. I told him I was with you last night and I think he got jealous. He started insisting that we get together tonight.”

“You know something?”

“What?”

“I’d do the same thing you would. I’d go.”

“Really?”

“Are you kidding? Look at all the times I went running back to Pamela.”

“Yeah, I guess you were kind of a glutton for punishment.”

“Well, as one glutton to another, why not give it a try?” I said.

“You think it might actually lead somewhere?”

“Probably not,” I said. “But it’s nice to have a little hope again, isn’t it?”

“Hearing “maybe” is always better than hearing “no.””

“That’s right,” I said.

“Even if “maybe” is a lie?”

I sighed. “Yeah, kiddo, even if “maybe” is a lie.”

“You’re really a wise man, McCain. You should run for pope or something.”

“I was thinking of that. I’d like to wear that hat he does. You know that really tall one? With the lifts I have in my shoes, that hat would make me seven feet.”

She laughed. “Thanks for being such a good friend.”

“My pleasure.”

Pause. “I really did want to sleep with you last night.”

“Same here.”

“Chad’s the only guy I’ve ever slept with, though. So it would’ve been a really big step.”

“I understand. I’m running for pope, remember?”

Mrs. Courtney was just leaving the two-story, redbrick Colonial-style rectory when I pulled up. She wore a black suit on this boiling day. She had the look and air of a millionaire’s wife, a somewhat lacquered and severe middle-aged blonde who did not belong out here in the sticks. Attractive but not appealing.

As if money-or in her case, the prestige of Harvard Divinity-had bled all the juices out of her. I reached her just before she got into her dark-blue Chrysler.

“Mrs. Courtney, my name is-”

“I know who you are, Mr. McCain. I hope you’ll excuse me but I’m in a hurry.

I need to be at the mortuary in five minutes.” Her voice was cool if not quite cold.

No reading on her eyes. Shades.

“I’d really appreciate ten minutes of your time.”

“For what, Mr. McCain?” The words weren’t slurred. But they were slightly indistinct. Or was I imagining it? It had now been a few hours since the snake cage but every few moments snake images filled my mind, daymares, skewing my hold on present reality.

“I need to talk to you about your husband.”

“I repeat, Mr. McCain, for what?”

Only then did I realize that she swayed slightly as she stood there, and only then did I catch the first wisps of gin aroma. Nothing else smells like gin. Praise the Lord.

“I’m trying to find out who killed him.”

“So is Mr. Sykes. And he told me about half an hour ago that he’s got some very promising leads.”

I had to be careful here. I owed her the deference one normally gives a widow. But she was way too bright to believe that Cliffie could find a murderer. Or his ass with both hands and a compass.

“Every once in a while, he arrests the wrong person.”

“He assures me that the person he has in mind is indeed the guilty party.”

“Did he say who that person is?”

She put a slender hand on the door handle.

Her knees gave a little, the way a drunk’s do when he’s been standing erect too long in one place. “Good day to you, Mr. McCain.”

“Do you really want your husband’s killer found, Mrs. Courtney?”

“What a ridiculous thing to say.”

“If you’re serious about finding his killer, you’re not going to leave it up to Cliffie.”

“Should I share your sentiments with him?”

“He knows my sentiments.”

“You’re being stupid, Mr. McCain. Why wouldn’t I want my husband’s killer found? I loved my husband.”

“Loved him enough to protect him even after he’s dead? Maybe there’s something you’re hiding, Mrs.

Courtney.”

She said, “There’s a wake tonight in his honor.

I need to get ready for that. And I’ve spent enough time with you.”

I put a hand on her arm. Carefully. “This isn’t any of my business, Mrs. Courtney, but are you sure you’re all right to drive?”

“You’re right, Mr. McCain, it isn’t any of your business.”

She got in her car and let the heavy door slam. She started the engine, then started the radio -classical music-and then started the air-conditioner. She swept away in a great Harvard Divinity moment.

My cousin Slim works at the state-run liquor store. There’s a push on-there’s been a push on for years-ffget liquor by the drink in Iowa and to make bottled liquor available in a variety of retail stores… but you know how it is with conservative legislators. They’re always accusing liberals of wanting to legislate morality-especially with civil rights-but they don’t have any problem telling you when and where you can buy liquor, whom you can have sex with

(technically, adultery is still punishable by jail time), and what you can read (they get to decide what’s objectionable). Excuse the political message here. But I get irritable every time I enter a state-run liquor store. It’s like getting a note from your mom telling you it’s all right to have a highball.

Slim is a Korean War veteran who had one burning-bright dream the whole time he was getting his ass shot at in the snow over there. He wanted to go to work for Uncle Sam once he got done fighting for Uncle Sam. I remember the college year I spent reading most of Chekov’s stories. I just got hooked.

Nobody ever wrote so well about the civil-servant mentality, and God knows, if there’s one country that has that mentality, it’s Mother Russia. Slim Hanrahan also has that mentality. He’s a slender, gray, balding man with yellow teeth and surprisingly lively blue eyes. His favorite size in everything is small. A tiny Nash for a car, a tiny tract house for a home, a tiny woman for a wife. When he’s in his cups, he always pats his flat belly and says, “Yessir, the way I figure it, I got it made. They say millionaires got it made. But they don’t.

You got money like that, you’re always worryin’ you’re gonna lose it. The way I see it, the people who got it made got government jobs. You really got to be a screw-up to lose a civil-service job. And then you got the right to appeal it, anyway. There’ll never be liquor-by-the-drink in this state, so I got a job for life. Reasonable hours, nothing heavy to lift, good insurance plan absolutely free.

And no layoffs. Those factory guys always braggin’ about how much they make an hour… but lookit how often they get laid off. Or go on strike. I’ve got it knocked.”

That’s Slim.

I decided to check with Slim since he works the day shift in our one and only liquor store.

Mrs. Courtney’s state of intoxication had made me curious.

“You ever see her in here?”

Slim fingered the clip-on bow tie he always wore. Another man was running the counter. “I don’t know if I should be talking to you about this stuff, Sammy.”

He always called me Sammy. I hated it.

“This is a murder investigation, Slim.”

“You think she did it?”

“No, but I think she’s acting awfully strange for a woman whose husband has just been killed.”

“Oh, yeah? Funny how?”

“You think Cliffie could solve a murder?”

He shone his yellow teeth at me. “Are you ki. in’? That idiot?”

“Well, she’s leaving it all up to him, she says. She’s too smart for that. Which makes me wonder if there’s maybe something she doesn’t want to come out about her husband.”

“I see what you mean. By the way, you going to the reunion this year?”

“Probably.”

“My old lady and Joanie O’Hara got into it the other night at the bowling alley. So I’m kinda nervous about goin’. You notice how the O’Haras think they’re a big deal since Wayne was made a foreman at the plant?”

“I guess not.”

“The first thing he did was get an extension phone. They have two phones now.”

“Gosh.”

“Their house is even smaller than ours and they got two phones. That’s what I mean, they walk around actin’ like they’re some sort of big deal. The wife said something about that new discount store out on the highway. This was when they got into it at the bowling alley. And you know what Joanie says?”

“What?”

“She says “I wouldn’t be seen goin’ into a place like that.” Like she’s too high and mighty to save a little money on stuff.”

This sounded like a matter for the United Nations if I’d ever heard one.

“Slim, you think we could get back to Mrs.

Courtney?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure.”

“So does she come in here and buy liquor?”

“Now she does.”

“Now?”

“Yeah, startin’ about four months ago. It was funny. Never saw her in here before. And then all of a sudden she starts comin’ two, three times a week.”

“Two or three times a week.

Isn’t that a lot?”

“It’s a lot for what she was buyin’.

Half-gallon of gin at a time.”

“Was she ever drunk when she came in?”

“Not drunk but drinkin’. Slurring her words, stuff like that.”

“Hey, Slim,” the man running the first register said, “I could use some help over here.”

The place had filled up suddenly.

“I appreciate it, Slim. Thanks.”

“I’ll bet at the reunion Joanie goes around tellin’ everybody about their new extension phone. Whaddaya bet?”

He went over and greeted his customer.

I drove out to the Judge’s place, something I don’t often do. The house is a huge Tudor set upon three acres of perfectly kempt grounds that are safe behind a black iron fence. When her Eastern friends visit-I met Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. there one day; Nelson Rockefeller and Jacob Javits another-the west lawn is covered with a vast tent, a six-piece classical ensemble, and enough booze to get Moscow drunk on a Saturday night.

The props were just now being set up as I aimed my ragtop up the curving drive to the manse.

I saw Lettie and Max and Maria, the regular staff, carrying armloads of serving bowls, glasses, cups from the house to the tent.

The florist was there, as was the caterer, as were the musicians. Jay Gatsby would envy what was being set in motion here.

The Judge herself was in her study, Gauloise and brandy in hand. You rarely saw her in jeans, but jeans she wore and a white silk blouse. She was a little bit Rosalind Russell and a little bit Barbara Stanwyck. She was also a little bit drunk.

“So nice of you to keep me informed, McCain.”

The study had one of those floor-mounted globes that was about half the size of the actual planet and walls and walls of paintings and photos of her Whitney forebears, all of whom looked constipated and skunk-mean. There was also a lot of leather furniture that smelled of a recent oiling.

She also smelled, as usual, of a recent oiling.

I wasn’t up for her sarcasm. “You want to hear about how I almost got my head shoved into a cage of rattlesnakes or not?”

That shut her up. Who could resist hearing a story like that? She was giddy as a girl listening to my tale of bravery and grace under pressure and which, I have to admit, I did embellish a tad here and there, especially the part about how I tied two rattlers together.

“You tied them together?”

“You bet I did. Otherwise they would’ve jumped on me.”

“No offense, McCain, but I’ve just never thought of you as being that smart.”

“Thank you.”

“Or that brave, for that matter.”

“Thank you again.”

“Let me toast you.”

She toasted me. You’ll notice she didn’t offer me a drink so that I could toast me.

“Ah,” she said, downing the brandy. “And you learned what, exactly, for all your travail with those damnable snakes?”

“I learned that I’m much smarter and braver than you thought I was.”

“You shouldn’t brag, McCain. It’s unbecoming.”

“And I learned that Bill Oates seems to be on exceptionally good terms with Viola Muldaur.” I told her about how early he’d been there this morning.

She said, delicately, “Dierdre keeps telling me that Sara isn’t home and will call me back.”

“Avoiding you?”

“What else?”

“I thought you were friends.”

“Best of,” she said.

“And she won’t talk to you?”

“Afraid not.”

“So she knows something.”

“Afraid so,” she said.

“And could be in trouble?”

“Maybe.”

I told her about the mother-daughter visit to my office and about how they went home on friendly terms. And then I said, “Dierdre’s pregnant. I promised her I wouldn’t tell you and I probably shouldn’t have. But you need to know.”

“She’s pregnant? But she’s just a little girl.”

She nearly choked inhaling the smoke from her Gauloise.

“Knocked up.”

“Please, McCain. You’re vulgar enough just standing there. You don’t need to enhance it.”

“With child. In a maternal way. Preggers, as our British friends say.” She was something of an Anglophile. I thought maybe she’d go for it.

“Poor Sara,” she said.

“Poor Dierdre.”

“And no idea who the father is?”

“Not so far.”

“Probably some greasy-haired high-school boy who drives around with his car radio turned all the way up. Like you, in fact, McCain.”

“Thank you for the third time today.”

“No wonder she doesn’t want to talk to me.” Then: “Are you any closer to figuring this thing out than you were before?”

“Not so’s you’d notice.”

“Then what do I pay you for, McCain?

You’re my investigator-investigate, for God’s sake. Don’t sit here soaking up my brandy and wasting my time.”

“You haven’t offered me any brandy.”

“Oh.”

“And as far as wasting your time goes, I thought you’d appreciate being brought up to date.”

She went to the window and swept a graceful arm toward the grounds.

“You maybe have noticed all the activity out there.”

“I did indeed.”

“Dick will be here very soon.”

“I’m trying to hide my enthusiasm so as not to embarrass myself.”

“I want him to be comfortable here and to think well of us. I don’t want him to think that we’re a bunch of hill people who throw snakes around in our religious ceremonies. And murder each other.”

“You’ll have your killer.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

A knock at the door.

“Yes?”

Max, the butler. “There seems to be some trouble with the lilies, Judge.”

“The lilies?”

“They’re lagging.”

“The lilies are lagging?”

“That’s what the floral man says, Your Honor.”

“Florist, not floral man, Max.”

“The florist says the lilies are lagging, Judge. He’d like you to join him in the tent.”

After Max was gone, the Judge, obviously unhappy, said, “Did you hear that, McCain?”

“I certainly did. Your lilies are lagging.”

“I pay this kind of money and they lag.”

“I don’t want to live in a world like this anymore.”

“You’re more sarcastic than usual today, McCain. And since you don’t seem to have any sensitivity toward my lilies, I may as well be honest with you.”

“Honest? About what?”

“That ridiculous story you made up about tying two rattlesnakes together.”

“You didn’t believe it?”

“Not for a second.”

“Well,” I said as I left, “it’s a hell of a lot more interesting than lagging lilies, I’ll tell you that much.”