Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 123, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 751 & 752, March/April 2004
His Deadliest Enemy
by Kate Wilhelm
Kate Wilhelm has been published widely in both mystery and science fiction, and she’s a star in both genres. A recent inductee of the Science Fiction Hall of Fame, she has also won that field’s Nebula, Hugo, and Jupiter awards, and the Prix Apollo. Her mystery and crime fiction work includes a series of legal thrillers which recently received the Spotted Owl Award from Friends of Mystery. The latest book in that series is Clear and Convincing Proof (Mira Books).
It was a lovely sunny day, last day of March, crocuses up, daffodils emerging, and on the table in her house Constance had seed packets waiting. There was a large bag of starting mix in the back of the car. “Heirloom tomatoes,” she had said to Charlie, who had looked blank. “Not as prolific as the newer hybrids, but better-tasting,” she had gone on, to a continuing blank look. “How many tomatoes do two people need?”
He had dived behind his newspaper at that. She was smiling slightly as she drove. Thursday, her last aikido class of the week was done, and seeds were waiting. Charlie would be gone until late afternoon on Monday, or possibly Tuesday. Today plant the seeds indoors, a head start on real gardening time. Friday clear straw from the fence where she would plant peas. Saturday shop...
She braked; a van was askew in the road, and a motorcycle half off the road, with a woman with a cell phone and several other people milling about a man on the ground.
Constance stopped and hurriedly got out of her car. “You’re out of range here,” she called to the woman. “How bad is he?”
She ran to the man on the ground and as she started to kneel beside him, she sensed movement behind her. Something was thrown over her head, over her shoulders; she was toppled and caught as the something was pulled all the way down her body to her feet, then drawn close, pinning her arms and her legs. She felt straps or a rope tightening around her. Helpless, she didn’t try to struggle, didn’t bother to scream or call out as she was lifted and carried. She drew in a breath, then tried to hold her breath, but it was pointless. She was already blacking out.
Charlie liked to fish, and he liked going fishing with Hal Mitchum, a good companion, next-door neighbor, pal, but by the time he pulled into the Mitchum driveway on Friday afternoon he admitted silently that he was pretty tired of Hal. They had left on Wednesday, and on Thursday Hal had stumbled in snow knee-deep, caught his foot in a hole, and had broken his leg. Thursday he had been in the hospital and now, Friday, Charlie was taking him home where his wife and however many of his four sons were around could listen to him complain. And Charlie would go home to his nice fire where he belonged, snuggle a bit with Constance, eat good food, and not wade through snow up to his keister. No one had expected the snow, but there it was, and the fish were probably still in Florida.
All four sons met the van in the driveway, with Doris hovering behind them. The boys were all a foot taller than their mother and a hundred pounds heavier — football players. Two of them lifted Hal and carried him, one took the crutches, and the last one grabbed his duffel bag, while Doris wrung her hands and Hal yelled back to Charlie that he would make it up to him, sorry about this, rotten luck, did he want a ride home...
Charlie hoisted his own duffel bag, walked around the house, and climbed the fence to the pasture, where Mitchum’s goats came to see what was happening. He crossed the field, climbed the fence to his own yard, and went to the back porch door. He took his boots off on the screened porch, then entered a cold house where the three cats met him with howls of indignation and rage.
After two steps into the kitchen, he paused. She wasn’t home. He could always tell and never could have said how, but the house was not the same with her gone. Her presence filled it, made it home. Brutus, the evil striped cat, stalked angrily around his feet while Candy, the tortoiseshell, cried piteously, and Ashcan tried to climb his legs. “Where is she, you guys?” Charlie said softly. Their food dish was empty, and the water bowl was dry. He walked on through the kitchen to the other side with cats as close as shadows, and saw a letter propped against a vase of flowers on the table. Seed packets were on the table, and her car keys. He picked up the letter, opened the envelope, and read the note: “Don’t do anything foolish. No police, no FBI. Sit tight and wait for a phone call. Don’t use the phone. She’s safe and comfortable. I trust you had a good fishing trip.”
A lump as hard and cold as an iceberg settled in his stomach as he read it a second time. He let it fall to the table and stood without moving for a time, then shoved Ashcan away and went back to the cat dishes, filled one with food and the other with water to shut up the beasts. After that he prowled silently through the house. There would be a listening device, he thought, something to let them know he had returned. No one would have expected him to enter through the back door. They knew he had gone fishing. Did they know when he had planned to return? He found the small device near the front door on the underside of a low table in the foyer. He didn’t touch it. It was probably voice-activated, or sound-activated, in which case the cats might have set it off with their yowling. If they had, the phone might ring any minute now. He looked at his watch, and continued his silent search. No sign of a struggle, nothing conspicuously missing. She had gone to her class in her gi, had not had a chance to change. Clothes were laid out on the bed, waiting for her.
Without a sound he went through the kitchen again, out to the porch, on to the garage, where the Volvo was parked. Her purse was on the front seat, a bag of potting soil or something in the back and, again, no sign of a struggle. Thursday, he thought then; they had taken her the day before.
Ten minutes had passed from the time he looked at his watch. He sat down at the kitchen table and examined the note again, not touching it this time, although he suspected that no fingerprints would be recoverable. Computer printout, cheap copy paper, cheap envelope, no stamp, no date. Who had known he was going fishing? A handful of locals, that was all. Ransom? He doubted that. Kidnapping was a federal crime, too risky for the meager sum he could come up with. Revenge, he thought then. And God knew he had made enemies over the years, first as an arson investigator, then a New York City detective, and most recently a private investigator.
He went over a mental list, shook his head. The folks he knew who might want to get even would not have written that she was safe and comfortable, and would not have added that bit about fishing. The envelope probably would have contained a bloody finger or ear.
He realized that both of his hands were aching painfully and he looked at his fists in surprise, then forced his fingers to open, to flex. The lump of ice was not melting. He wanted to kill someone.
Ransom, revenge, pure deviltry, what else? In his head he heard a voice: “You’re exactly the person I want, Meiklejohn. I want your expertise.”
“Merrihew,” he said under his breath.
March first. Overnight snow again, and a cutting cold wind. Endless winter, Charlie thought, disgruntled, when he went outside to bring in more firewood. He took the wood to the living room, added a piece to the fire, and went back to the kitchen to give a kettle of chili a good stir. It was his day to cook. Chili, cole slaw, cornbread. Feast enough for the gods, he decided, sniffing, then tasting. Too spicy? Maybe, but it was too late to do much about it. The doorbell rang and in his continuing foul mood he went to see what idiot was out there instead of inside warm and dry.