“Good morning, Paul.” Harry Chisum was affable enough.
“How long have you been here?”
“Half an hour perhaps. I came by yesterday but you weren’t here.”
“Irene and I were doing the art museums.”
“Yes well I suspected you two were together. I didn’t want to trouble Irene with it. I wanted an opportunity to talk to you alone.” Chisum had a deerstalker and a walking stick in his hand; he wore a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows, and a bulky grey cashmere sweater under it; he looked younger than Paul had seen him before but his expression was grave.
“You could have phoned, saved yourself all that traveling back and forth.” Paul heard the ring of his own voice and resented it: it sounded hollow.
“It’s better this way. I didn’t want to — forewarn you.”
“Very mysterious.”
“Am I? Well why don’t we go up to your apartment.”
“Yes of course. I’m sorry...”
In the elevator he touched his thumb to the depressed plastic square and watched it light up. The old man tucked the walking stick under his arm. It was a slender stick of hardwood, gone completely black with antiquity; it had a head that appeared to be a chunk of ivory fixed to the stick with a bronze collar. It didn’t mesh with Chisum’s tweed and cashmere; it was the sort of thing you carried when you wore an opera cape. But the old man was indifferent to appearances.
“Well then, to what do I owe this honor?” It sounded weak and silly; he immediately regretted having uttered it.
“I think you know.” Chisum’s words had a dry rustle. The doors slid open; Paul led the way along the corridor, fumbling for keys.
He let the old man waddle in ahead of him; he shot the locks before he pocketed the keys and shrugged out of his coat. “I haven’t had breakfast yet. Join me?”
“Just coffee. I’ve eaten.” Chisum trailed him toward the kitchen and stood there with one shoulder propped against the jamb. He unbuttoned the jacket and let it hang back; his flannel trousers were pleated and cinched high and looked more than ever like a mailbag.
Paul busied himself with utensils. His hands rattled things. He tried to concentrate on it, to avoid looking at the old man. The silence became almost unbearable: finally he wheeled. “All right. What is it?”
“She’s dented your armor, hasn’t she. It’s taught you to be afraid, and that’s no good. Fear must be avoided like a whore with gonorrhea.”
“What are you talking about?” The pulse was thudding in his temples.
“Friday evening — that news report about the baker and his saleswomen. I was watching your face, Paul. I think that was the moment when the enormity of your error struck you fully for the first time. If I hadn’t been looking right at you at that moment I suppose I’d never have suspected. But the whole thing was written on your face. You’re not a very good actor — you’re a poor dissembler, really, I’m amazed you’ve been able to keep the secret this long.”
“I’m trying to be polite, Harry, but I’m getting a little impatient. I have the feeling I’ve just wandered into a one-act drama of the absurd by mistake.”
“There’s an old Japanese proverb: You can see another’s ass but not your own. But I think things started to fall apart for you the other night — or perhaps even earlier. You’ve been discovering yourself all over again, haven’t you. Irene has exposed things in your heart you’d forgotten existed. You could only prevail so long as you could convince yourself that no point of view other than that of your own prejudice existed. Your view of things took the form of a violent solipsism, and you had become the most dangerous of men — a man with an obsession. But there was no room in that structure for a relationship with any other human being. You were only safe as long as you could endure the fact that there was no one you wanted to confide in. You met Irene, and everything changed. The other day — those two boys at the playground, molesting the little girls. You couldn’t kill them, could you. You shot them, you’ve lamed one of them for life, but you couldn’t take their lives.”
“Now wait just a minute...”
“You’re the vigilante. I have no doubt of it.”
“You’re crazy. Stark raving—”
“Stop it, you’re wasting wind. Even if I were wrong it wouldn’t hurt you to listen to what I have to say. And if I’m right it may save your life.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Chisum shifted his stance: he leaned on the opposite side of the doorway. “The water’s boiling.”
The blood had drained from his head and a red haze clouded his view: he was afraid to move because he wasn’t sure he wouldn’t fall down.
The old man said, “The day you first met Irene at the criminal courthouse a man was released on bail from that very courtroom. A few hours later he was dead, shot by the vigilante. I’d known that all the time, but I only made the connection when I saw your face the other night after that news report. I’m not sure I can explain it more clearly than that. I simply knew. I saw it in your face — all of it.”
“You’re a lawyer. That’s hardly evidence. You’re barking up the wrong—”
“I’m not trying to pin anything on you. I’m not trying to trap you. But you may as well abandon these unconvincing protestations of innocence.”
“Why haven’t you gone to the police with these demented suspicions?”
“I have no intention of going to the police. That’s what I want to talk to you about.”
“If I’m the homicidal maniac you claim I am, you’re running a tremendous risk. Didn’t you think about that before you came here? If I’ve killed fifteen or twenty people what’s to prevent me from killing you?”
“You’ve persuaded yourself that there’s an important difference between you and your victims. You’ve never shot anyone who wasn’t guilty, in your view, of a terrible crime. I haven’t committed any crimes. Therefore you couldn’t possibly kill me and justify it to yourself.”
“You’ve got pat answers, haven’t you.” He was bitter. “You’re the most incredible character I’ve ever met. I don’t know whether to laugh or feel sorry for you.” He felt stronger now but dulled, as if drugged: reality seemed to have receded to a point beyond arm’s length. He spooned instant coffee into two mugs and stirred the water in. “How do you take it?”
“Black,” Chisum said. “Just black, I’m in mourning — for that baker and his saleswomen, among others.” He reached for the mug and backed away through the doorway. “Why don’t we sit down?”
There was little choice but to follow him into the living room. Harry settled back on the couch carefully, balancing his coffee. Paul stood above him, watching with narrowed eyes.
“It is possible,” the old man intoned, “that God’s justice ordains that certain persons must die for the good of humanity. It’s possible, but the fallible human conception of justice is probably inadequate to decide who is to die and who is to survive. To put it another way, Alexis de Tocqueville observed that it was the great privilege of the American system that citizens were permitted to make retrievable mistakes. Clearly a man who’s been shot to death has no opportunity to retrieve his mistakes.”
“Do you want to trade quotations, Harry? I’ll give you Edmund Burke: ‘Wars are just to those to whom they are necessary.’”
“To kill a man because it’s ‘necessary’ isn’t the same thing as killing a man because it’s right. But you don’t make that distinction, do you. You’ve been obsessed with the idea of your own personal brand of star-chamber justice, where you alone are judge and jury.” Then Harry said overcasually, “At least you’re no longer pleading ignorance. I may take your remark as an indication that I’m correct in my conclusion?”