The Maine Massacre

8

De Gier walked for more than an hour, cold to his bones and struggling with his hat and branches that whipped into his face. Most of the way was uphill, and an icy breeze blew snowflakes into his eyes and froze the hairs of his mustache and eyebrows. It had also frozen the doors of the Dodge, and he had to warm the lock with his lighter. He smoked while he waited for the engine to warm up.

The road leading to Jameson seemed even worse than before, and he drove as slowly as he could, steering in the direction the car chose for itself and pumping the brakes when he didn't agree with the car's choice. The road's surface reminded him of some of the landscapes he had seen from the window of the intercontinental plane when it pierced the skies of Greenland and Newfoundland: a shiny eternity of frozen quietness, totally devoid of human life, a beautiful but frightening wasteland dominated by white or cream mountains and cut by gorges, violet in their own deep shadows. The road, properly photographed, could have been the cover of a science-fiction paperback, suggesting the weird miracle of another reality. The shock of change had touched off his perceptions, and the recent boredom of the gray days in Amsterdam was no more than the memory of an uninteresting and mostly forgotten dream. He grinned, forgetting his caution, and the car accelerated and made a sudden hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. "No," de Gier said gently, "not that way, this way!" He eased the car around again and kept trying until he reached the jailhouse. The compound was silent and, in the office, Bernie, the chief deputy, nodded sleepily and seemed disturbed when one of the telephones jangled. De Gier listened while he took off his coat and hat. Something about eggs. Another deputy, by the name of Bert, didn't have eggs, and Bernie thought that Bert should have eggs. De Gier went upstairs, found his bed, lay down and lit a cigarette. He put it out a few minutes later and closed his eyes, telling himself he should think about Cape Orca. When he woke up the room was dark. He found the sheriff in the office and was offered coffee. The two men had no chance to communicate, for a sudden commotion in the jail required the sheriff's prompt attention. De Gier left, telling Bernie, who was still taking care of the desk, that he meant to do some shopping at Robert's Market and would be back presently.

"You missed dinner," Bernie said.

"Never mind. I'll buy some food at the store."

Bernie grinned. "We'll get you something when you come back. The prisoners are on twenty-four hour duty." De Gier grinned back. He could hear the sheriff's steely voice admonishing somebody behind the heavy jail door. The sheriff's vocabulary seemed most impressive, although somewhat repetitious.

The Dodge was easier to handle this time, for the town's roads had received a good sand sprinkling. The few street lights reflected on snow banks, a wan, green shine interspersed with deep, sinister shadows. He turned and stopped under the extended roof of Robert's Market.

There was a blaze of light under the porch, calling attention to some ten different signs, partly overlapping so that it was hard to understand what they were suggesting the customers should buy. Three signs mentioned beer, another ice. Why would people want to buy ice? The sign had an arrow that pointed at a metal box. He got out of die car and opened the box. Plastic bags filled with ice cubes. He still didn't understand. Iced drinks. But surely all Americans had refrigerators and each refrigerator would have at least two trays of cubes. So why did people want more? A man came out of the store, opened the box, and took out two bags of ice. "Excuse me," the sergeant said. "What do you want ice for?" The man stared. De Gier repeated his question. "Party," the man said. "Party tonight. What else?" The man shook his head and walked away. De Gier nodded. Of course. An advanced drinking country.

The lights of the store seemed to be reserved for its exterior, for the large room inside was dark and gloomy. A young man with a round red face under a compact mass of tiny, whitish curls was serving beer to three customers who sat on high stools. They didn't turn around, but de Gier recognized them and smiled. His third day and he already knew everybody. The fox fellow, Madelin, and Albert. He said good evening, but the guests didn't turn around.

"What can I do for you?" the man with the whitish curls asked. There was no warmth in the question.

"Some cheese," de Gier said. "Some crackers, candy bars, peanuts, cigarettes, a flashlight, batteries for the flashlight."

"Help yourself."

De Gier shuffled through the store, studying the unfamiliar labels on cans and plastic bags. The display of goods was haphazard. Apparently new stock was placed wherever there was room. When he couldn't find what he wanted he thought of asking the storekeeper, but the four heads in the other corner were close together. They had obviously forgotten his presence. He stumbled on, eventually located the required articles, and took them to die counter where the storekeeper grabbed a stub of pencil, wrote down figures, and came to a total.

De Gier paid and asked for a bag.

"Sorry, no bag."

But there were bags. The sergeant saw a stack of flattened brown paper bags on a shelf on the wall behind the counter.

"Give me one of those. I'll pay if you like. I can't carry all this in my hands."

There was no response, but the fox fellow slipped off his stool, went to the door, and locked it. He took the key out of the lock, dropped it into the pocket of his short heavy jacket, and went back to his stool.

"Three beers, Tom."

"Three beers coming up."

"Make it four. Have one yourself."

"Four beers coming up."

The refrigerator behind the counter opened. Four cans of beer slid onto the counter. The beer was sipped slowly, straight from the can. Nobody looked at de Gier.

The sergeant's purchases were still on the counter. He studied his collection. If he picked the articles up he could carry them to the door, but he wouldn't be able to open it even if it were unlocked. He would have to ask somebody to open it for him. He might try to grab the bag, but he would have to get over the counter to reach the shelf that held the bags. Tom might object to his climbing the counter. He could handle Tom, but the fox fellow and Albert would be on Tom's side, and Madelin had given no sign that she disagreed with her friends' behavior. Any trouble arising from his grabbing a bag could be explained as the lawful start of a fight, with the enemy on the right side of the law.

Fine.

The locked door presented another interesting problem in any further proceedings. Obviously the act of locking a customer in is illegal. Restriction of the liberty of a human being. But he would have to prove the locking of the door.

He went over the options again as he got on the last stool at the counter. Yes, there was nothing he could do. Kicking the door out of its hinges would be explained as willful damage committed by an irresponsible foreign visitor, for they would unlock the door afterward and claim it had never been locked. He might, of course, remove the key from the fox fellow's pocket. The fox fellow would not like that. Back to base one. A fight, four against one. No.

De Gier produced a cigarette and lit it. He thought of asking for a beer, but Tom might not hear him. Tom was picking his teeth with a match he had sharpened with a long knife. He had left the knife on the counter, within easy reach. De Gier studied the skin on Tom's hand, soft skin covered with tiny, very blond hairs. A good knife with a thin, wicked blade. He had fought men with knives before. But to a fight a man who holds a knife takes concentration, and he wouldn't be able to watch what the others were doing. Tom threw the match into a carton filled with garbage and picked up his beer can. He drank, looking straight ahead. The fox fellow was tracing a crack in the counter with his forefinger. Albert had closed his eyes and was whistling. Madelin was reading the label on her beer can. De Gier smoked and rearranged his purchases, the processed cheese in front of the carton of crackers. He stacked the candy bars and put the carton of cigarettes on top and the peanuts on top of the cigarettes. He unscrewed the plastic flashlight and inserted the two batteries. He flicked it on. It worked. He flicked it off again. The cigarette had come to its end and he dropped the stub on the floor, rubbing it out with the heel of his boot. Nothing happened for the next ten minutes. Albert's whistled song repeated itself endlessly. A monotonous theme, but quite exact. De Gier listened to every repetition. He wasn't particularly worried. He had found the answer to the puzzle. There was nothing he could do but wait. There was nothing the enemy could do but wait. They would have to outwait each other. But the enemy was several steps ahead of him. The enemy could drink beer and be together, he could do nothing and he was alone. And the enemy could call the end of the game.

What next? Another cigarette? But he had just put one out. He felt in the side pocket of his jacket and his hand came up with an Amsterdam bus ticket. He held the ticket at arm's length and read its text: "This ticket is valid on the day of issue for any distance on an Amsterdam streetcar or bus including transfers provided that…" He crumpled the ticket and threw it into the garbage carton. Not too interesting, no plot, no characters. He glanced at the enemy. The enemy wasn't doing anything in particular, but Albert still whistled. Even so, there had been some subtle change. Albert's pouted lips blew a variation on the theme and his foot tapped twice. The taps seemed to set off the fox fellow, who got up, walked to a position halfway between the counter and the door, and began to click his fingers. Madeira's right hand became a fist, and her knuckles hit the warped and stained counter. Tom did something too. He picked up his knife, turned it around, and made the handle repeatedly touch his beer can. The sounds didn't blend at first, but Albert's whistling became a little louder and he held a note, broke it, and held it again. The rhythm fell into place.

De Gier got off his stool and unbuttoned his jacket. The enemy turned toward its prey, but the whistling, clicking, knocking, and rapping continued. De Gier's hand reached into his inside pocket and produced a flat black leather case. The whistling stopped, then started again. He opened the case and took out a small metal flute and screwed its two gleaming parts together. He blew his first note. It fitted into a missed beat of the knocks and clicks, and the sergeant breathed in, held his breath for four bars, and blew a higher, much longer note. When it broke, Albert's whistling caught up and spread and de Gier made the flute go down and become the whistle's shadow. He wouldn't dominate the enemy, he would be content to follow. He knew the tune. "Straight, No Chaser." A very good tune, created and played by the best musicians on the Coast and in New York City. He had the tune on at least twelve records. He had played it often with Adjutant Grijpstra accompanying on his old set of drums. But perhaps the present rhythm section was more of a challenge than the methodical approach the adjutant, the faraway adjutant, had offered on previous occasions. He knew the adjutant's style well and liked to adjust to Grijpstra's ways, but the enemy was new and bound to produce surprises, sudden changes, a whole new way of making use of the tune's possibilities.

He started the high note again but cut it into slivers and got back into the theme, repeating it to give the others a chance to fit in. Madelin was the first to start the chant. There was a word to the chant: Cannonball. Tom chanted with her, using the word's syllables to stress the main theme of the tune. Madelin's voice reminded the sergeant of the iced landscape he had seen in the Orca road surface, but the emptiness was no longer void. There were beings in it now, transparent and floating. The hoarse, thin voice of the fox fellow gave the beings more form and de Gier began to recognize some of the creatures on the edges of his mind, but not quite, for they were of his dreams and wouldn't enter into actual, definable existence. Can-non-ball. The word seemed logical, the only word that could be used in the chant. He remembered that he should follow rather than lead and Albert's whistling filled the store again, reaching into its dark corners. Tom had left his protected nook by vaulting across the counter. He no longer held his knife and the beer can. The fox fellow was no longer clicking his fingers. The chant had become powerful. Even quiet Albert was chanting, and Madelin's voice rose and broke die limitations of the room. She sang the last syllable of the chant's word. Ball. High and eerie but also sweet. A holy sound, de Gier thought, but truly holy, cleansed of the goodness that clings to angels and saints, approaching the purity that can no longer be named.

He was facing the door when it opened and the sheriff and chief deputy came in and stood between the shelves holding giant cola bottles that formed a corridor into the store. The store's scanty light reflected in the blue metal of their guns and the silver badges on their Boy Scout tunics. The tune halted abruptly when the flute dropped away from de Gier's lips, and Tom vaulted back to his place behind the counter. He faced his customers and smiled.

"What can I do for the law this evening?"

"Any sandwiches left, Tom?"

"Yes, sheriff. Turkey or salami? Eat here or take out?"

"Turkey. What do you want, Bernie?"

"Turkey."

"Turkey, twice, to take out."

The sandwiches appeared from the depths of the refrigerator and looked fresh and tasty. Tom wrapped them, pulling the plastic from a slit in the counter, pulling and cutting the thin film in a single movement. The sheriff paid and the two men turned and began to walk back to the cruiser waiting under the awning, partly visible through the door's glass. The cruiser's wide nose nudged the timid shape of de Gier's Dodge.

"Evening, sergeant," the sheriff said as he eased his way past de Gier. "See you later in the jailhouse. I still have an hour of patrol to get through with."

De Gier nodded. The door closed and a hand touched his wrist. He looked up into the light yellow brown eyes of the fox fellow. The door's key rested in the fox fellow's outstretched hand. De Gier took the key, walked to the door, inserted the key into the lock and turned it. There was a click, but no latch moved out of the lock.

"A trick lock?"

"No, just old."

"You have used it before?"

The fox smiled, a pleasant slow smile. "Not too often. It tends to upset people."

"Sergeant?"

Tom had joined them. He held a brown paper bag. "Your things. The bag is on the house. I like your flute, come again."

The fox laughed. "You don't have to say that, Tom. You've got the only grocery store."

De Gier carried his bag to the door. The girl slipped past him and opened it.

"Thank you."

"Do you remember where I live, sergeant?"

He remembered. The house behind the realtor's office. He also remembered that her father had gone to the Bahamas.

"Yes."

"I'll be waiting for you."

Her feet hardly touched the snow as her slender body, wrapped in a tight fur coat, flitted to a large car parked in the yard by the store.

When he switched the Dodge's radio on the sheriff was talking to the deputy called Bert. "But we've got to get eggs, Bert. You know that the egg truck overturned. Robert's Market won't have any eggs for a week. The prisoners want eggs for breakfast."

"I can't get them, Jim. I tried. Nobody has eggs to spare, it's winter. They've slaughtered most of the chickens." The radio crackled.

"I may get some duck eggs from Smithtown. Would the prisoners eat duck eggs, Jim?"

"Get duck eggs, Bert. Get them tonight. Ten four."

"Sheriff," Bert said. "Jim, please. That's thirty miles each way and the roads are bad. Maybe he's out of eggs too. He's got no phone. You don't want me to go nowhere for nothing, Jim."

"Ten four, Bert."

"Jim!"

"Ten fucking four." The sheriff's voice was low, almost loving, but it had a frazzled edge.

De Gier pressed his microphone. "Sheriff?"

"Ten three, sergeant."

"I may be late, Jim. Madelin Astrinsky has asked me in for a drink. I am on my way there now."

The radio chuckled. "Good for you. Are you still on Main Street?"

"Yes."

"I want to talk to you for a little while. Don't go to her just yet. Go up Main Street and keep on going. There will be some elm trees on your right. You know what elm trees look like?"

"I think so."

"Tall straight trunks that only fork high up. They died some years ago, but the town hasn't allocated money for cutting them down yet. Died of your Dutch elm disease. Stop there. Keep your engine running. I'm out of town now but coming back."

The elm trees reached up with great surging gestures. The bark was peeling off and waved slowly in the dying breeze. The naked ghost trees impressed the sergeant. Corpses, skeletons almost, but still expressive of the life power that had made them grow into huge symbols of the planet's urge to join the sky. The small blue car had slid to a stop facing some dried-out weeds that threw shadows on the snow, a moving bristle of sharp black lines. The windows were icing over and de Gier scraped them. He saw the white glow of the landscape stretching away on both sides of the deserted road. The cruiser's lights appeared in the curve ahead and approached rapidly. Its growing bulk seemed evil, a disturbing entity about to interfere with his bliss. He got out of the car and the frost bit into his face. He impatiently adjusted his raccoon hat, but the tail still dangled over his face. That hat had been bothering him in the car too, but he hadn't dared take his hands off the wheel. He couldn't take the hat off now either, as it was protecting his ears.

The sheriff waved invitingly, and de Gier stumbled to the car's rear door, which had swung open. The cruiser's back seat was a simple wooden bench, and the windows on each side of it were barred. There were no handles on the insides of the doors.

"Hope you don't mind sitting in the prisoners' quarters, sergeant, but we won't keep you long. Just wanted to fill you in."

The sheriff had opened the thick glass partitioning behind the driver's seat. The chief deputy filled the right side of the front seat. He was eating his turkey sandwich.

"They did the trick of the door on you, right?"

"Yes."

"They've done it before, a perfect trap. I asked you to meet me because mere's a CB radio in the store and they have our channel. Was it on while you were there?"

"No."

"It'll be on now. I've asked for a scrambler, but the state can't afford it. Everything we say on the radio is public knowledge. The door trick didn't work, did it? You all seemed quite merry when we came in. What happened?"

De Gier told him.

"Yes, I thought I heard music at first, but that store is so dark you can't see what's going on. Good, so that's the first round won. But the gong sounds again. Now Madelin wants you, right? That's good too. You should be able to get some information."

"How long has she been with the gang, Jim?"

"I am not too sure. Bernie's an expert on local history. Tell him, Bernie."

The fat deputy swallowed and turned. "Ever since the gang formed, sergeant, ten years ago maybe. They were youngsters then, and we used to run them in for slashing tires and breaking windows. They used to be a public nuisance, but it was all easy stuff. They're different now."

"Do they have records?"

Bernie looked at what was left of his sandwich. There was nothing left. He folded the plastic, making the crumbs run into his hand, and ate them. "No, not really. That early stuff got wiped out because they were underage, and after that it was just speeding and drinking in a vehicle parked in the public road." He yawned and looked at his watch. "Another half-hour, Jim."

"I did a little work today, sergeant," the sheriff said. "I saw the town clerk. Cape Orca has three present owners. There's Mrs. Wash, of course, she owns the bulk of the land. Then there's Michael Astrinsky, who has bought all the vacated properties, and Suzanne Opdijk still owns her house and land. You might count Jeremy as a fourth owner since the island is his and the island is in Orca Bay and Cape Orca embraces that property."

"Astrinsky? Did your realtor friend tell you about the real value of Mrs. Opdijk's house?"

"Yes, ninety thousand. And Astrinsky offered thirty you said."

"So Astrinsky is playing Monopoly, trying to get a whole street. What would he want with the street?"

"A marina perhaps," the sheriff said. "He could build a jetty with a little port for pleasure craft. It wouldn't be a bad proposition."

The sergeant looked at the metal bar separating him from the driver's seat. The bar was worn smooth by sliding handcuffs. "Yes. And Astrinsky took off for the Bahamas. Any chance of getting him back for questioning?"

Bernie laughed. "Astrinsky? He's a big shot, sergeant. He knows the governor. He's a town selectman. He's the president of the Blue Crustaceans. Everybody owes him favors. Astrinsky is a big fish in a small pond."

The sheriff nodded. "I could make him come back if I asked the state cops to start an official investigation, but what do I tell the state cops? No, sergeant, it's just us, puttering around. You did some puttering today. How is Jeremy these days?"

The sergeant reported on that morning's visit. The radio came on and Bernie answered the call.

"Game warden here," the radio said. "That you, Bernie?"

"Yes."

"Got that dog?"

"I thought you were going to kill that dog."

"No," the radio said. "And you know it. We agreed twice now that you were going to do it and this is the third time we're agreeing. Let us know when you've got the dog. Better let us know tomorrow."

"Ten four," Bernie said. He pushed the microphone back into its clip and cursed.'

"Same ten sixty-four again, Bernie?" the sheriff asked.

"Yes, Jim, same old ten sixty-four. They're passing the buck to me and I pass it back."

"Not this time, it seemed to me," the sheriff said.

"What's a ten sixty-four?" de Gier asked.

Bernie was studying the dashboard. His face was impassive but there was some movement in the rolls of fat in his neck. "Dog-deer complaint, sergeant."

"Dogs hunting deer?"

"Yes, sergeant," the sheriff said. "The dogs go after the deer but so do the tourists. We like to sell them hunting licenses and cabins and supplies and anything else they think they need. It's part of the business of the county. The game wardens are supposed to patrol the woods, but they use helicopters. They don't like to work on the ground; they reckon we can do that. If they see a dog hunting deer they'll track the dog and find out who owns it, and they'll warn the owner once. The second time they shoot the dog from the chopper. But the dogs are getting clever, and hide when the chopper is around so we have to come in and do the job."

"Right," Bernie said. "And we're busy. Everybody has a dog here and nobody ties the dog up. The dogs chase anything they see and deer are the biggest thing they see, and they don't kill the deer, they just cripple them. One dog can cripple a dozen deer in a day."

"So you shoot them?"

"Sometimes. The locals don't like us shooting then-dogs; they like us to warn them. So that's what we do. We go around warning dog owners. I've warned the owner of this particular dog a dozen times. And every time old Bill says, 'Sure, Bernie, won't happen again. I'll tie him up.' But he never does. And I never see the dog. Bill hides him when he sees the cruiser. Bill has lived here all his life. He runs a saltwater farm. A very crafty man, old Bill Thompson, too crafty for me. But the game wardens don't want to know. They speak to me every other day."

"Yes," de Gier said. "What do you think about these murders of ours, Bernie?"

The deputy crumpled the plastic from his sandwich into a little ball, opened the window, and threw the ball out. He pressed the window's button and the glass zoomed up. "Littering, a one-hundred-dollar fine. Everybody does it all the time. You tell them it's unlawful and they laugh. You write a ticket and they slash your tires. Murders? What murders? Seems to me you've got to prove them. Just one would be enough. Then you can call in the state cops. Homicide is not the sheriff's business. He can spot it, but he can't work on it too much."

The sheriff seemed bored. His small, narrow hand moved over the controls of the cruiser's dashboard and touched a button. The siren barked once, tearing at the silence outside. "You heard what the sergeant said, Bernie. Mary Brewer's corpse was found, not her boat. Maybe we can find the boat."

Bernie pointed at the bay. "That boat is out there, Jim. The bay is freezing up. We can't look under the ice."

"The boat is orange. Orange is a good color. If it hasn't sunk, it'll show up from the sky."

"We don't have an airplane, Jim."

"We don't have many things, but others do. I have a friend in the Coast Guard, an officer. The Coast Guard has dozens of choppers. Maybe they need exercise. I can ask for a favor; they've asked us for favors. I don't need an official investigation to make a few choppers fly around."

Bernie belched.

"You don't think I should ask the Coast Guard?"

"Sure, Jim, go ahead. Maybe the boat will turn up. Maybe we can connect the boat with the gang. The gang is bad, Jim. Look what they did to my cruiser. Look what they did to poor Captain Schwartz. Sure the guy is a Nazi and sure Nazis are bad, but Schwartz was nuts, just nuts, harmless. He would walk around in that crazy uniform and he would foul-mouth niggers and Jews, but it was all talk. He didn't do no harm. He was a quiet old guy, but the fox visits him and the next thing we see is Schwartz hotfooting it out of town. His son or nephew or somebody comes out and sells the house and has a yard sale and all die captain's goodies go for a nickel and a dime."

"The fox," de Gier said. "Does he have any particular reason to dislike the Nazis?"

Bernie shrugged. "Don't we all? Old Fox died in the war, got shot in France. A few hundred thousand other G.I.'s got shot too. Why hold that against Schwartz? I tell you, the fox is bad. All of them are bad. They hang around and smile and get their college degrees and cut boards out of stolen timber, but when they get a chance to be real bad they take it. Look at what happened to you tonight. Okay, so they didn't make it with you, but they scared the shit out of many another. They've kept people for hours in that store, locked behind an unlocked door."

"True," the sheriff said. "Maybe you better go, sergeant. You've a pleasant appointment waiting for you, but take care. Madelin is a bit of a vampire. She may suck your blood when you nod off. I'll open the door for you."

He winked when de Gier got out of the cruiser. "Have a good time, sergeant. Take your chance, although 1 suppose you get enough opportunities in Amsterdam. Do you?"

"It comes and it goes," De Gier said. He felt too tired to respond to the wink. The raccoon hat had turned around again and the fluffy tail was getting into his mouth.