The Ax

28

About three miles before the turnoff to Scantic River Road, still inside Connecticut, there's a gas station with an outside pay phone on a stick. That's where I stop to make my call, glad to see this phone has the same exchange as GRB's. Local calls disappear more readily.

I'm phoning GRB's house because I had a sudden revelation last night. So many marriages fall into trouble among the downsized; not just mine and Marjorie's. What if GRB and his wife have split up? What if he's living somewhere else, all the time I'm crouched in the woods behind his house, waiting for him?

Or, another possibility. What if he's taken one of those time-serving jobs, say, assistant manager at the local supermarket, then he'll never be home during the day. For whatever reason, and there must be one, he hasn't been home the two days I've watched the place. So it's time to find out what the situation is.

Nine-forty. She won't have left for her walk yet. I dial the number from GRB's resume, and she answers on the second ring: "Blackstone residence." She sounds efficient but impersonal, as though she's chief of staff there, not the lady of the house.

I say, "Garrett Blackstone, please."

"He's not in at the moment, may I say who's calling?"

"It's an old friend from the papermill days," I say. "Is there any way I can get in touch with him?"

"Well, he's at work right now," she says. She sounds a bit doubtful.

I say, "Could I call him there?" I need to know where the man is, dammit.

"I'm not sure," she says, not wanting to offend an old friend of her husband's, but troubled by something. "He's just started there," she explains, "and he might not want outside calls right now."

"Oh, it's a job he likes?"

"It's a wonderful job," she says, and all at once the restraint gives way, and she bubbles over, saying, "It's just the job he wanted!"

Arcadia! The son of a bitch got my job, I'll kill him today, I'll kill him in an hour! Gripping the phone so tight my hand is cramping, but unable to relax, I say, "Oh? Back at a paper mill?"

"Yes! Willis and Kendall, do you know them?"

Five hundred pounds drops away from my body. I could dance. I say, "The tin can labels!"

"That's right! That's just the job, do you work there, too?"

"Oh, that's great," I say, and I truly mean it. "That's wonderful. Mrs. — Mrs. Blackstone, please give your husband my, my strongest congratulations. Tell him I'm delighted for him. Oh, tell him I'm delighted."

"Who should I say—"

I hang up, and float back to the Voyager. I couldn't be happier if I had a job myself. It's true; well, almost true. But he's at work, he's in a position, he's where he wants to be!

By God, I don't have to kill him.

Oh, that's great, that's great. Starting the Voyager, making the U-turn, I'm grinning from ear to ear.

As the miles go by, as I drive closer and closer to home, the weight slowly settles down on top of me. Two to go.