The Ax

36

I am parked down the block from the Coach House. It is five to one, Friday afternoon; almost time for HCE's lunch with Ms. Laurie Kilpatrick.

Nine days ago, when I realized I couldn't get at HCE directly, and began to think about this other way to do it, I drove all around this part of the state, looking at restaurants, and decided that, for my purposes, the Coach House in Regnery is ideal. It's fairly upscale, the kind of place where the local gentry goes, and it's right on the main street of town, so there's no problem parking or being anonymous. And there are large mullioned windows on the street, Colonial style, through which a pedestrian can easily see the front part of the restaurant, where the maitre d' greets the customers and where there's a small seating area of two benches for people to await their lunch companions.

Will HCE be early? I'm sure of it. At five before the hour, he's probably in there already; time for my first walk by.

I get out of the Voyager, which I've parked half a block from the restaurant, and stroll down the sidewalk.

Yesterday afternoon, I phoned here, to make a reservation for two in the name Kilpatrick, so he'll be told the reservation does exist but the other party hasn't arrived as yet, and naturally he'll take a seat in the waiting area.

And is that him? I stroll by, and one man is on the bench there, sitting back, looking confident, one leg crossed over the other. A very good dark suit and dark figured tie, close-cropped gray hair, a squarish face; that's all I can see in that first glimpse.

I walk on, pause at an appliance store, study the VCRs and fax machines in the window for a few minutes, then turn and stroll back the way I came. A longer look at him now, and I'm sure this is my man. He has a blunt way of sitting, a square-jawed, take-command expression on his face, and just a hint of excited anticipation. HCE, at last.

I go back to the Voyager, get behind the wheel, sit watching the entrance to the restaurant. It's pretty popular; well-dressed people keep going in, usually in pairs, usually men together or women together, occasionally a mixed couple, but all middle-aged or older. I don't see another singleton who matches my idea of HCE.

1:10. Time to confirm my guess that the military-looking man in the suit is HCE. (The suit, which looks to me very good and very expensive, is the one small cause of doubt here.) Is he still waiting? Or is someone else there in his place, the real HCE?

No. Still him. He's still my man. The former Marine instructor who spent his entire working life with one company. He's looking less confident now, slightly distressed, and when I walk back toward the Voyager I see him looking at his watch.

Again I sit behind the wheel. The only question now is how long it will take him to give up.

1:45. He's still in there. He must know by now that Ms. Kilpatrick isn't coming, something's gone wrong. But still he waits, hope against hope, the faithful soldier.

I hate doing this to him, the elation and then the humiliation, the terrible feeling of wretchedness and no way to strike back at the unfairness. If there'd been any other way…

Well. This situation has its grim moments.

2:05. Is he never going to give up? He can't sleep in that restaurant, he'll have to leave sometime. Did he decide to eat lunch there anyway, pay for it himself?

Unlikely. HCE and I can't afford places like the Coach House any more.

Should I get out of the car, go see if he's still seated there? If somehow he's gone out some back way, left the restaurant, I should know it. But what if I do get out, and I'm halfway there, and he—

There. At last, he comes out into the sunlight. Standing, he's shorter than I expected, but compact, a stocky man in good physical condition. He stops on the sidewalk, at a loss, looking up and down the block, and then he shakes his head and turns to walk in my direction.

My face is turned away, I'm looking at the bank directly across the street, when he walks past me. Then I turn back and watch him recede in the right side mirror, ramrod stiff. When he's a little farther along I watch him in the inside mirror, and remember poor Everett Dynes, and briefly close my eyes. I don't need that memory now.

He's turned, he's stepping between cars, he's turning again, he's unlocking a car door. When he opens it, I see the car is black; I would have expected that from him. I start the Voyager's motor, sit there with it idling.

Now nothing happens. What is he doing in there? Probably, come to think of it, with the relative privacy of the interior of his own car, probably he's allowing himself a minute to be unglued, to be angry and unhappy and frustrated and afraid. But, if I know my man, he won't need long.

No. Here he comes. It's a Ford Taurus; HCE would buy American.

I switch on my left turn signal. His Taurus drives by me, then a gray Chrysler Cirrus drives by me, and then I pull out.

We drive out of town, me keeping at least one other car between us, his black Taurus always clearly visible up ahead. Out of Regnery, this secondary road takes us over to State Route 9, where he turns north toward Sable Jetty, as expected.

There's more traffic on this road, but he's still easy to follow. I'd thought his anger and frustration might make him drive too fast or too aggressively, but he's a law-abider, and we stay respectably just above the speed limit whenever we aren't slowed by trucks.

I expect him to take the right turn that leads into Sable Jetty, but he doesn't; instead, he continues on up Route 9. I follow, keeping well back, wondering where he's going. North of town, he'll meet the other end of River Road, but that would be the long way round to his house.

Here's River Road, with the diner beside it and the big mall just beyond it, on the other side of the road, and that's where he's going, the mall. He signals for a left, moving into the special mall lane there, and the three cars between us all go straight ahead, and I too signal for a left as I come to a stop behind him.

There's no traffic light at this spot, but there is one some distance ahead, and shortly after that one turns red the southbound traffic peters out, and then we can both make our turn, and so can the two cars that have come along behind me.

It's harder to follow him in the parking lot, without being noticeable. I stay well back, seeming indecisive about which lane I want, while he heads confidently forward and then to the right, and parks some distance away from the main building, half a dozen empty spaces from the nearest parked car. Is he afraid of dents and damage from other people getting into their cars next to his? I think that would probably be like him.

I find a slot closer to the building, and stop, and take out my memo pad and pen, as though I've chosen this moment to do my shopping list. I'm aware of him walking this way, then see him clearly first in the right mirror, then the inside mirror, then the left mirror.

Please. Let this one not be as awful as Everett Dynes.

When he's almost to the end of the row of parked cars, I finally get out of the Voyager, lock it, and follow. He's crossing the lanes between the parking area and the mall building, and I'm not very far behind him. Other people are walking here, too, from their cars. We all enter the building.

This is an enclosed mall, with a long broad corridor from these doors, flanked by chain stores of all kinds, and with a three-story Dolmen's at the far end, Dolmen's being a line of suburban department stores, mostly or maybe entirely in malls. In front of Dolmen's, the corridor Ts left and right, with more shops facing the fashion windows of the department store. Only the part of the building containing Dolmen's is more than one story high.

HCE walks briskly down the long corridor. He certainly seems to know where he's going. Could he be planning to buy himself something, some small luxury to soothe his feelings? He doesn't seem the type.

Dolmen's, that's where he's going. The sliding doors open for him, then close, then open for me, and I see him moving just as briskly as ever toward the escalators in the middle of the store.

I keep well back. There are a good number of shoppers in here, but it isn't really crowded, and I wouldn't want him to become aware that he's seeing me every time he looks around.

Not that he does look around, really. He's clearly concentrated on his destination. Up the escalator he goes, and I can tell he would step briskly upward except that the large family in front of him, everybody but Dad, is standing still.

I hang back, and hang back, and don't board the escalator until he's nearly to the top. Then, as I am rising upward, I just glimpse him make the U-turn and march back toward the second flight.

Yes. As I come off the first escalator and turn toward the second, I just spy his hand and part of his dark suit moving up. I follow.

He's at the top when I reach the bottom, and I see him angle left. I walk up the moving steps, gliding rapidly upward, and when I can see the third floor he's nowhere in sight.

That's all right. I saw him go leftward, toward the left rear of the store, and there aren't that many sections up here. I'll spot him any second.

But I don't. I move along that leftward aisle, looking both ways as I go along, as though searching for something to buy, not a man to kill, and he isn't anywhere. The final department up here is menswear, racks of suit jackets and sport coats along two right-angled walls, and he isn't here, either.

Where the hell did he go? I'm not worried yet, because whatever he's come here for will take him at least a few minutes to choose and buy. He's in this quadrant on this level of the store; I'll find him.

I'm still standing in the middle of menswear, frowning one way and another, deciding which route to take first, when HCE himself comes out from a doorway in the very corner, between the racks of suits and coats. He sees me, and smiles, and marches toward me, and I'm bewildered and frightened and ready to run. Then I realize, he's now wearing an oval blue-and-white nametag. It says DOLMEN'S in the upper half, and below that it says "Mr. Exman."

He works here. He's a suit salesman, that's why his own suit is so good. He's a suit salesman and I'm a customer.

"Yes, sir?" he says, hands clasped together, beaming at me in a way I know to be false to his nature and probably abhorrent to his soul.

I can't just stand and stare. I have to be quick-witted, I have to move things along smoothly, I have to not seem astonished, or guilty, or afraid. I have to be nothing at all, a blank customer, in front of a salesman. "Just looking," I say. "Thank you."

"If I can be of help," he says, with that smile, "you'll find me around."

There are no other customers in this section at this moment, and no other salesmen visible. We're alone here, but not usefully. "Yes, yes, thank you," I say. I don't want him to remember me.

Or, wait. Yes, I do. I'm thinking now, I'm seeing the possibilities all at once. I return his smile, I don't turn away, and I say, "It's a sport jacket I need, for summer, but I can't pick it out for myself, my wife has to be with me. So now I'm just looking around."

"Yes, of course," he says, nodding, sharing my male experience. "We always have to listen to the wife."

"She's a teacher," I explain, "so she's working today, but I could come back with her tomorrow."

"Good idea," he says, and slides two fingers into his inner jacket pocket and produces a business card. "I'll be here," he tells me, extending the card. "If you don't see me, ask."

This sort of job is mostly commission, of course. I take his card and look at it, and it's like his nametag, with the store name prominent above and his own name printed below. On the card, on the lower right, it also says, "Sales Representative." I nod at the card, and at HCE. "I'll be back," I promise. Then I switch the card to my left hand, stick out my right, and say, "Hutcheson."

"Mr. Hutcheson," he says, pleased.

We shake hands.

I walk away from him, my mind suddenly full of ideas. I put his card in my pocket, telling myself I must remember to throw it away soon. In the meantime, I have things to do, beginning with a telephone call.

There's a bank of phone booths just inside the main entrance of the store, next to the large sign giving Dolmen's opening hours; on Friday, it's "12 till 9." I throw HCE's card away in the trash barrel there, check my pockets to be sure I have enough change, and step into a booth, where I phone Marjorie, at home. We both say hello, and I say, "Could we eat dinner early tonight?" We usually eat around seven or seven-thirty.

"I suppose so," she says. "How early?"

"Well, I ran into a guy I used to be at Halcyon with. He's got some sort of idea, some business he thinks we could go into."

Sounding dubious — quite rightly — she says, "Do you think it's any good?"

"Don't know yet. He wants to show it to me at his house this evening, the specs he's done and everything."

"Does he want you to invest something?"

"Don't know that yet, either," I say, and laugh, and say, "If he does, he's barking up the wrong dead tree."

"He certainly is," she says. "What time would you want to leave?"

12 till 9. HCE started late, nearly two-thirty, so he'll surely stay till the store closes. "Seven," I say.

"We'll eat at six."

"Thanks, sweet," I say, and hang up.

And now, I have shopping to do. If you want to kill somebody, you can find everything you need for the job down at the mall.