“I was outside your house when they pulled him out, Ms. Phelps. He was cut up pretty bad.”
“The E.M.T.’s said he could be treated at home.”
“I talked to them. Both techs said you told them terrorists were after Elstrom and that he could get killed in the hospital. You also told them you would have guards here to protect him.”
Amanda smiled. She had a lovely smile.
“Where are the guards?” Till asked.
Amanda smiled.
Till turned back to me. “I like having lunch here. It’s calm, and peaceful. I might come here every day.”
“It’ll get cold soon.”
“I love the brisk days of autumn.”
“I didn’t mean that soon. I meant in January and February.” I gave him a steely look I’d practiced once in front of a mirror. “Maybe forever,” I said.
Till picked up his paper bag and stood up. “Sure you don’t want some? I left plenty.”
I shook my head.
He held it out to Amanda.
She smiled.
Till walked the five steps to the trash barrel. “I should leave this on the bench. Keep the flies away,” he said.
“One thing I forgot to ask, Till. Did you ever get the lab results on what blew up my shed?”
He paused, his lunch bag poised over the barrel, and he grinned. “Solvents. Paint thinners, turpentine, gasoline.”
“No D.X.12?”
He dropped the bag in the barrel. “Rest up, Elstrom. I might be back.” He started up toward his car.
“One can only hope,” I said after him.
Amanda helped me stand. She waved Woody off, and we walked slowly up toward the turret.
“Did I really say, ‘Don’t let me talk’?”
“You told me you didn’t want to talk under sedation. I calledLeo as they were rolling you up to the ambulance. He said if you were thinking clearly and could convalesce at home, it would be better for you. He said with the money that’s going to be lost at Crystal Waters, and the lawsuits that are sure to be filed against the Board, the Board will be going to the ends of the earth to get out from under any negligence claims. Leo thought they’d start by trying to blame you for an ineffective investigation. Leo said you’d be in court for the rest of your life.” She paused. “You know what I think, Dek?”
“I’m afraid to ask.”
“I don’t think you were thinking of your own skin, or what was left of it.”
We got to the door of the turret. “Poor Stanley,” I said.
“That’s what I believed, and it almost got you killed.” She held the door open for me. “But you’re the only one who will ever believe that now.”
The next week, the Bohemian came down to the bench by the river carrying a slim box wrapped in silver paper. “Vlodek.” He rolled the name. “You look horrible. Much worse than you sound on the phone.”
With effort, I slid down a bit on the bench so we could both watch the river. He sat down.
“How are you?” I asked.
“Right as rain,” he said. He looked it. His skin was back to its usual prosperous bronze. “Miss Terrado, my accuser, got arrested for shoplifting the day before yesterday. ‘Heiress Caught Stealing,’ the paper said. After detailing her growing eccentricities, the reporter, a nice boy, the nephew of a friend, devoted some space to Miss Terrado’s preposterous accusation against me, noting that the F.B.I. anticipated the matter would be dropped.”
He started to hand me the slim, wrapped box, saw the cast, and said, “A token, Vlodek. Allow me.” He slit the paper with his hugethumb, removed the top of the box, and held it out for me to see. It was the largest fountain pen I’d ever seen. “A 1928 Parker Duofold, in Blue Lapis. I restored it myself.” He set the pen down. “You can use it to endorse this.” He pulled a Crystal Waters Homeowners Association check from his suit-coat pocket and held it up.
“Two thousand?”
“The association is virtually bankrupt, and with the lawsuits-”
I imagined he had to shake Ballsard pretty hard to come up with the two thousand. “It’s fine,” I said.
He smiled, relieved. “Your suggestion that I visit the Novak house was most productive. I met with Mrs. Novak’s sister, who is now her guardian, and presented her with a letter from Bob Ballsard, assuring her that the Board will begin paying Stanley’s pension immediately and will also expedite her claim against his life insurance policy. Mrs. Novak will want for nothing in her current home, poor woman.”
“I’ll bet Ballsard was most enthused about writing that letter.”
“As you predicted, but he was persuaded when I told him I had every hope of recovering all the extortion money. Besides, as you also pointed out, Stanley dying a hero might minimize claims against the Board for negligence.”
“You looked around Stanley’s garage?”
“Mrs. Novak’s sister was quite cooperative once she realized I was acting in their best interests. She gave me the key and told me to take anything that belonged to Crystal Waters. It was in the attic of the garage: five hundred and ten thousand, untouched.” He patted my good shoulder. “As you requested, I told the Board only that I recovered the funds through a confidential source.”
“That ten thousand-”
“-did not have a bill newer than 1970.” He beamed. “And the five hundred thousand was still in the attaché case. I don’t think he ever opened it.” He watched me.
“Attaché-” I started to stutter. “Son of a bitch.”
He patted my good shoulder again. “Perhaps surveillance is not your forte.”
“Thank you, Anton.”
“You’re a moral man, Vlodek. I like that.” He stood up. “I told the Board you would be discreet.”
He took a step toward the street but then turned. “I meant to bring you a bottle of ink for your new pen, but there are so many colors. I didn’t know which you’d like.”
I waved my good hand. “Anything will be fine.”
The Bohemian glanced over at Amanda, planting bulbs for the spring by the base of the turret. She was wearing my cutoff red sweatshirt. “I think red, perhaps,” he said. “Red is such a vibrant color.”
I followed his eyes. “Red is perfect.”
Leo drove me in the pink Porsche with the top down. “It’s silver rose, not pink,” he said again.
“Pink enough, Leo.”
“Endora likes it.”
“And for that it must be treasured.”
He did some fancy downshifting, just to show me he could, and pulled up to the entrance to Gateville. A Maple Hills squad car was parked by the guardhouse, its uniformed officer talking to a guard. The guard came over to the Porsche.
“Brumsky and Elstrom,” Leo said, handing up our driver’s licenses. “Anton Chernek arranged it with Mr. Ballsard.”
I loosened the chin cord and pulled off the tan big-brimmed Tilley hat Amanda had bought me to keep the sun off my stitches. The guard checked our faces against the license photos, and handed them back with photocopied waiver forms that absolved the Board of responsibility for anything that occurred during our visit, like us getting blown up by an undiscovered cube of D.X.12. We signed the forms and handed them back.
“Jeez, put the hat back on, Dek,” Leo said as we started up. “You look like Frankenstein, post op.”
I pulled on the Tilley as Leo turned left and started clockwise around Chanticleer Circle.
At first blink, the houses at the east end of Gateville looked the same: big and blessed in the sun. But then the uncut grass, untrimmed shrubs, and scattering of fast-food wrappers, dropped by the curious and blown over the wall, popped out like black teeth on a beauty queen. Nobody was at home in Gateville anymore.
We circled slowly around the east end and started up the back stretch. Around the bend ahead, the mounds of blackened bricks and charred wood looked like World War II photographs of Dresden, the day after the Allies had flown over and obliterated it.
“Jeez,” Leo said, stopping the car. He shut off the engine.