“We’ll start with this,” he said. “Have you received any unsigned mail in the past few days? At your office or your apartment, either one.”
Eric frowned. “Snail mail?”
“Any kind of mail.”
“No, nothing.”
“Have you sent me or your sister anonymous notes?”
“Have I— Why would I do a thing like that?”
“Answer the question.”
“Of course not. What kind of anonymous notes?”
“This kind.”
He took the three sheets from his pocket, the one to Angela and the two he’d received, and laid them side by side in front of his son. Eric’s face seemed to harden as he read them, as if his flesh were solidifying from within. When he raised his head his eyes were angry.
“Rakubian,” he said.
“You know it’s not Rakubian.”
“How would I know that? Who else—?”
Hollis said nothing, watching him.
“They sound like his kind of crap,” Eric said. “But this one... ‘What did you do with his body?’ What does that mean?”
“What do you suppose it means?”
“Somebody thinks you had something to do with him disappearing, is that it?”
“Well?”
“You didn’t, did you?”
“Dammit, you know I didn’t kill him.”
“Dad... I never thought you did.”
“Okay, that’s enough,” Hollis said wearily. “No more lies or evasions.”
Eric blinked at him. “Hey, wait a minute. What made you think I might’ve sent those notes? I wouldn’t care if you’d chopped Rakubian up into little pieces and fed ’em to Fritz—”
“That’s not one bit funny.”
“I wasn’t trying to be funny. You know I’d never do anything to hurt you or Angie—”
“Not if you were thinking clearly.”
Strained silence for a clutch of seconds. Then, slowly, “You’re afraid I had something to do with whatever happened to Rakubian. That’s why you had me fly up here.”
“It’s time, son. Past time.”
“For what?”
“To get it out into the open. All of it, on both sides.”
“I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.”
“Eric, I know. I’ve known all along. I was there not long after you. I found him where you left him.”
“Where I—”
“Who did you think cleaned up his house, got rid of the body? You must’ve guessed it was me.”
Eric sat without moving, his eyes round but showing nothing of what he was feeling or thinking.
“You can tell me how it happened or not,” Hollis said. “That’s up to you. The one thing I have to know is whether you went there with the intention of killing him. Did you?”
No answer. Not even an eyeblink.
“Did you, Eric?”
“When?” The word seemed to come from deep within; his lips barely moved.
“When what?”
“When was he killed? When did you find him?”
“I just told you—”
“Dad, you answer me now. When did all this happen? What day?”
The sudden sharpness in Eric’s voice, more than his words, brought the first stirrings of doubt. Hollis said, “The Saturday before Angela left for Utah.”
“The day I found the box in the garage.”
“You had every right to be furious—”
“Sure I was furious. But not enough to kill him. I couldn’t kill anybody, not even to save Angie. You never did understand who or what I am, did you?” Eric’s body seemed to loosen all at once; he leaned forward so abruptly that his elbows banged the table, rattled the coffee cups. “Listen to me, Dad. That day I did exactly what I told you and Mom I did — drove out to the coast, then up along the Russian River. I didn’t go to San Francisco. I didn’t see Rakubian.”
“You... didn’t...”
“I didn’t kill him. It wasn’t me.”
The truth.
Hollis knew it, accepted it all at once. Certain knowledge replacing the false belief, the rush to misjudgment.
Somebody else had gone to Rakubian’s home that afternoon, somebody else with a powerful reason to hate him and to want him dead. Somebody else had picked up the raven statuette and crushed his skull. Somebody else...
And the corpse, the blood, the carpet, the garbage bags, the cleanup, the nightmare drive, the cop, the gravedigging, the burial, all of it, all of it... for nothing.
He’d covered up somebody else’s murder.
He sat stunned, the truth like a hammer beating at his senses. There was relief in him... Eric was innocent... but in these first moments it had been dwarfed by the weight of his own mordant guilt.
“Eric,” he said thickly, “get me a brandy. Double shot.”
“You’re not supposed to drink...”
“Just get it. Please.”
Eric hesitated, then lifted to his feet. He seemed to be gone a long time. Then the snifter was in Hollis’s hand, the brandy inside him in two convulsive swallows. Its spreading heat let him think again.
“Dad? You believe me?”
“Yes. I believe you.”
“Why’d you wait so long to talk to me? All those questions at home the day after, on the phone the other day... why didn’t you say something either of those times?”
“I thought it’d be easier if we just pretended... if we kept our own secrets...” He pressed the heels of his hands against his temples. “You were right — I never did know you very well, did I.”
“Maybe you didn’t try hard enough. Maybe I didn’t, either.”
He nodded. I’m a goddamn fool, he thought.
After a little time Eric asked, “What happened that Saturday? Did you go to Rakubian’s place because you thought I had?”
“Yes.” He explained about Cassie’s phone call, his discovery of the body. The words came in a rush, hot and acidulous in his mouth. “His skull was crushed... and I remembered you saying that was what you wanted to do to him, crush his skull. It never occurred to me that somebody else might’ve done it. I’m sorry... I’m so sorry.”
“If I’d been in your place,” Eric said slowly, “I’d’ve thought the same thing. So then you cleaned up everything, to protect me.”
“No other reason.” Hollis told him the rest of it, everything except the exact location of the grave. Purging himself. When he was done, Eric seemed to be looking at him in a new way. But he couldn’t tell whether he’d gained or lost stature in his son’s estimation, just that he’d been reevaluated.
“It must’ve been pretty bad,” Eric said. “If that cop had looked in the trunk...”
“Might’ve been better if he had.”
“Don’t say that.”
“I screwed up. Not just that day — before and since, all the way down the line.”
“What do you mean, before that day?”
He felt the urge to confess his original plan. I was going to kill him myself, he wanted to say, shoot him down like a dog. And I might have if somebody else hadn’t done the job for me. That’s the really ironic thing here, you see? Somebody else killed him, not me, not you, a third party took care of the problem, and all I had to do when I found him was walk away or call the police and it would’ve been over then and there. We might have been suspected, you and I, but there would have been no proof because we’re innocent and eventually they’d have found out who did it... some little piece of evidence I took away or destroyed. Now it’s too late. Now we can’t call the cops, we can’t dig up Rakubian, and the person responsible not only got away with it but may be stalking us now, like Rakubian stalked us but for no comprehensible reason. All I’ve done is exchange a known threat for an unknown one.