The door opened so quickly, I was sure Deedra had been lying on the floor right inside it, with company. In the light falling through from the hall, I could see a male leg, and since it was dark, I deduced that Marcus Jefferson had succumbed to temptation once again.
Deedra looked very pissed off, and I couldn't blame her, but I didn't have time for it.
"Tell me again what you told me—about when you came home from work early to give Pardon the rent check."
"I swear to God you are the weirdest cleaning woman in Arkansas," Deedra said.
"Talk to me. For once, I want to listen."
"Will you go away right after? No more questions?"
"Probably."
"Okay. I came home from work. I ran upstairs to get the check Mama had given me. I took it down to Pardon's. The door was a little open. He was lying on the couch, his back to the door. The area rug was all rumpled and the couch was crooked. I said his name, I said it a lot, but he didn't move. I figured he'd maybe had a drink and passed out or he was taking a hell of a nap, so I just put the check on his desk, to the left of the door. This what you want?"
I beckoned to her to keep on.
"So ... so then, I ... well, I went back and got in my car. I had to go back to work even though I just had a few minutes left. You wouldn't believe how ticky Celie Schiller is. ..."
"Lower your voice and speed up," I suggested quietly.
"My maid tells me what to do," she told the air, "Incredible."
But she looked in my face and went on. "And then I got in my car... and I backed out of my place, and put it in drive to go out, and I had to go out careful because of the Yorks' stupid camper. ..."
I held a finger to my lips. Her voice was rising.
"That's what I wanted," I whispered.
"Oh, don't want to hear about the run in my hose that day?" she asked with killing sarcasm, then shut the door firmly in my face.
I ran my fingers through my hair and gripped two handfuls of it. I stood there thinking, my eyes closed, still facing Deedra's door. I took a few steps down the hall and tapped Claude's door with one finger. I couldn't risk more.
No answer. I turned the handle. Locked, of course.
I went back down the stairs quietly. Even if I'd been standing in the bottom hall, I wouldn't have heard me.
I didn't know why I was so tense, why my mission seemed so urgent. But I never ignore the back of my neck, and the skin of it was crawling. There was tension in air. In the silent building, the air was humming with it. I opened the door with a feeling of relief to be getting out, and I eased through the opening as silently as I could manage. I re-locked the door behind me.
Going from the lighted hall to the relative gloom of the parking area cost me some vision, and I stood still to let my eyes adjust. Pardon had installed one all-night security light in the middle of the garage, and it lit up that immediate area like stage lighting. But the illumination didn't extend to the end stalls. I skirted the edge of the light and drifted to the outside wall of the garage. For maybe five minutes, I stood in the darkness, listening. I shifted my foot, and something clinked.
Slowly, I crouched down in the weeds that had found life against the wall of the garage, sprouting through cracks in the pavement. I patted the ground gently. My fingers found a familiar shape, traced it. I tried to pick up what I'd found all in one piece, so it wouldn't jingle. I held it up close to my face. Pardon Albee's key ring. I had nowhere to put it; there were at least fifteen keys on the metal circle. The safest place was where they'd been, so I gently laid them back in the weeds, where they'd been since the day he died.
Nothing moved. I didn't hear anything but the faint sound of a car cruising by in the street. Even that died away. But as quiet as it was, I knew there were people near. I could feel the hair standing up on the nape of my neck. So I slowly rose to my feet, nearly moved away to the safety of my house, wondered if I would make it.
I extended my hand to the knob on the camper. It was in the camper that Pardon's body had been concealed; if any evidence remained, it would be in that little space.
The Yorks hadn't been due home until night. But they'd come home earlier, the day Pardon had died. I knew it.
And then I turned the knob. The door popped open with a click, and just as I took in a breath of triumph, a huge shape launched itself at me from the black interior.
I didn't have a chance to defend myself. In ferocious silence, I was being beaten, and I needed all my breath to fend off the blows, to keep the fists from killing me. I knew only one person was there, but it was a person possessed of a demon, a man who seemed to have more than two hands.
I had to fight back or I would die, but the frequency and pain of the blows left me scant brainpower. I formed a fist and struck the first thing I could see, some ribs, not an effective blow, but a start, a gesture. I was weakening and soon I would be down on the ground, and it would be all over if I fell. It was almost a miracle I'd managed to keep on my feet as long as this.
Then I caught a glimpse of exposed neck and drove the edge of my hand in as hard as I could. My attacker gave a grunt and faltered, and I thrust-kicked with all my strength, not really caring where it landed as long as it sank into him. He staggered, and I could take a deep breath, and then a voice behind me said, "Stop right there."
Who? Who should stop? My attacker was in no doubt, and he threw himself at the source of the command, again moving so quickly and with so much determination that the speaker and I were unprepared.
The struggle came into the light, moving toward the center of the parking area, and I could see T. L. York and Claude rolling on the ground, struggling for a gun that I thought must be in Claude's hand. Their hands and legs were so confused and I was so dazed by the suddenness of all this that for a second I stood staring blankly, as if I had no stake in the outcome. I was weak enough to be shaking, but I had to move, to help—whom?
"Lily!" Claude said, in what he maybe intended as a shout, and that decided me. Only the innocent one would want my help.
I circled them, looking for my chance. It came when T. L. rolled on top of Claude, still gripping both Claude's wrists. I leaped in to straddle them, grabbed T. L. by his hair with one hand and cupped his chin with the other, and pulled back hard, almost hearing the faint echo of Marshall's voice adjuring me to be careful practicing this in class, since a wrong move could cause serious injury.
Well, this was serious-injury time. I twisted his head and pulled up. You have to follow your head. The rest of his body had to come up, too, or his neck would break. With a howl, he let go of Claude and raked backward, trying to get me off him, but I had my fingers sunk in his still-thick hair. In agony, he reared back, but my legs were locked on either side of him, I was gripping him with my knees, and the only way he could get rid of me was to do what he did next—fall backward on top of me. I wrapped my legs around him as he left the ground and heaved back, and I never loosened my grip on his head. I began squeezing with my strong legs, my ankles crossed over his gut, and he rolled from side to side trying to dislodge me.
"Hold still, goddamn it!" said a voice I could hardly recognize as Claude's, and again I didn't know if he meant me or T. L. I didn't have a lot of options, since I couldn't breathe and I could tell only my own rage was keeping me attached to him.
Then the gun went off. It was deafening. T. L. screamed, and since my grip had loosened at the shock of the sound, he could roll off me and continue to scream. Suddenly, I could breathe. I didn't feel like getting up, though. It was enough to lie on the filthy concrete and look up at the moths circling in the light.