That much McCann was fairly sure of. The rest, which was everything she needed to close the case, remained obscure. She could understand that Dale Watson might have come to believe that the only place he could finally “lay down his head” was in death. But if suicide was his aim, why kill two total strangers too? And why choose a deserted house in Evanston to do it?
Maybe the question was the answer. Maybe Watson had deliberately set out to create an insoluble mystery which would enlighten others as he had been enlightened, an action as random and meaningless as the passion he had suffered, and which had made his life unlivable.
Maybe. Maybe not. As Eileen McCann tidied her papers away and prepared to turn her attention to other matters, the one thing she felt reasonably certain of was that no one would ever know.
8
The chance discovery of Sam’s phone number sparked an idea which firmed up into a project over the course of the next few weeks. The more I thought about it, the more excited I became. I had always wanted to visit the Pacific coast, but had never been farther west than St. Cloud. Now was the ideal opportunity to indulge in a prolonged bout of white-line fever. I had plenty of leisure and no other plans or commitments. And if I needed further justification, I could always claim that it marked another essential stage in my quest for full citizenship, a kind of personal manifest destiny. What have Americans always done, given half a chance, but head west?
I bought maps and guide books, then a car. This was also a Chevy, but a very different animal from the Nova, one of those elephantine gas-guzzlers which Greg had been driving that night we were pulled over by the traffic cop on the way back from the Commercial. I found it both comforting and exciting, but couldn’t be bothered to figure out why. That was another sign of the way I had changed. Analysis once again seemed as irrelevant and misguided as it had back in the seventies, a futile attempt to understand what can only be seized and lived. Understanding hadn’t saved my wife or my son. Why should it save me?
The day I left was mild and sunny. I surged through the commuter traffic like a whale through minnows, heading for deep water. I found a country and western station on the radio and cranked up the volume. My classical records and tapes were in storage, along with the whole way of life they represented. I was heading north to Grand Rapids, then west on to Highway 2, the old route to the coast which I had chosen in preference to the sterile efficiency of the interstate.
I felt deliciously light of head and heart, like a teenager again. I had no idea where I was going, still less what would happen when I got there. That was the idea. For years I’d done nothing which had not been scheduled, priced and planned down to the last detail. Even a trip to the movies had become a major logistic exercise involving extensive coordination and consultation. And yet we might just as well have thrown a dice for all the good it had done us. Now I was prepared to take my chances. What had I got to lose, after all? I had already lost everything.
Calling in on Sam was a minor aspect of the trip. I didn’t think about him once during the drive across the agricultural grid of North Dakota and the badlands of northern Montana, past innumerable isolated farmsteads, each with its pickup and barn and satellite dish and gaunt tree from which a tire swing dangled like a noose, through innumerable small towns whose most memorable feature was their name: Niagara, Petersburg, Devils Lake, Palermo, White Earth, Wolf Point, Wagner, Harlem, Kremlin, Galata, Cut Bank. The road had led me on across the mountains and out on to the plains of eastern Washington, then through another chain of mountains to the ocean and a town called Everett.
Everett is not a pretty place. In fact it was one of the uglier towns I’d seen on my trip. The chatty motel clerk gave me the whole story. Originally built to serve the pulp mill industry, it was now a big naval base, a status for which the local citizens had lobbied long and hard. If that hadn’t worked out they’d probably have tried to get a nuclear power station, or have the state pen moved there. It was that kind of place. It was also the end of the road, where Highway 2 meets the Pacific.
I stopped at Dairy Queen on the outskirts of town and ordered a cheeseburger and rings to keep my indigestion up to speed. At the table across from mine, a couple of economy-size women in muumuus and elaborate perms were loudly discussing a friend’s colostomy in graphic detail. On the other side of the divider, next to me, a trio of teen tarts were rehashing their Saturday night live.
“So he goes, ‘No fucking way!’ and I say, ‘Way!’ And it’s like I’m getting weirded out, OK? And I’m going, uh-oh! You know? So I tell him, ‘I’m outta here,’ ’cos I’m getting like majorly, majorly stressed. So I’m home later, and I’m like, wow, this is totally out there.”
It was then that I remembered Sam. For the first time since leaving home, I had to make a decision. I could go north, or south, or I could turn back, but I had to decide. My week on the road had been interesting, but it had also been enough, at least for now. I couldn’t face the prospect of any more meals in truck stops where everyone was either on the move or wished they were, or any more nights in motels where I woke at three in the morning with images of David and Rachael swarming in the darkness all around me, and got up and sat on the tweed-upholstered sofa and watched CNN until it grew light outside.
Now darkness had fallen again, and Dairy Queen was filled with happy families who thought of themselves as unhappy, who squabbled and whined and bitched and left in tears, little knowing their luck, their incredible, unearned good fortune at simply being able to go home together. It was not their happiness that I envied so much as their unhappiness. I too wanted the luxury of carping and complaint, the safe thrill of sniping at sitting targets, of taking your distance from the place where “they have to take you in.” But I had no home to go to. The only person I knew for a thousand miles in any direction was Sam. In retrospect, it was inevitable that I would call him.
A man I didn’t know answered. Sam wasn’t there, he said. He’d try to contact him and have him call me back. I was at a pay phone outside Dairy Queen. It had started to rain, a fine persistent enveloping drizzle which furred my clothes and skin. I gave the guy the number, went back inside and had another cup of coffee. It was another forty minutes before the phone outside started to ring. It was Sam. He sounded preoccupied, and not particularly pleased to hear from me, as if I represented a problem of some kind.
“So where are you at?” he demanded.
“Everett. You know it?”
“Yeah. You’re pretty close.”
There was a pause.
“Want to come tonight?” he said.
“Well, is that OK? I mean I don’t have any other plans, but I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”
“It’s OK,” Sam said flatly. “I just got to think.”
Another pause.
“You got wheels?” he asked.
“Sure.”
“What are you driving?”
“An old Chevy. Kind of a blue-green color. It’s got Minnesota plates and a big antenna on the back.”
“OK. Here’s what you do. Take 1–5 north to Highway 20, then turn off for Anacortes. Go into town and park on Main Street, across from the clock. Aim to be there in about an hour and a half. It’s less than fifty miles, so you can take it easy. I’ll send someone to meet you.”
“Hey, are you sure this is not a problem?” I said, slightly disconcerted by his abrupt tone. “I mean I didn’t let you know I was coming or anything, and …”