“So you’re telling me, all you’re gonna have to do is ask Swanson if he did this, and no matter what he says, you’ll know the truth, just like that.”
“I don’t know that for sure,” I said. “But I’ve gotta give it a try, see what my gut says when I hear it from him.”
“What if your gut is wrong? Hasn’t that ever happened?”
“I suppose it has, once or twice.”
“Once or twice? You want me to name a few times your gut’s been wrong, just the ones I’ve seen myself? Hell, I could make a good living betting against your gut, Alex. I could buy a new car and retire to Florida.”
“You’re a funny man,” I said. “I’m so glad you made bail today.”
“Alex, I’m begging you. Take your gut and go home, will ya? Go back to being a hermit for a while. You’re gonna get us all in even bigger trouble than we are already.”
“All right, take it easy, Jackie. I know you’ve had a tough day…”
“I need some Rolaids,” he said, patting his apron pockets. “Where the hell did I put my Rolaids?”
Jackie’s stomach didn’t get any better that night. I didn’t get any less pissed off at him for being a stubborn, ungrateful jackass. Right after dinner, he did the unthinkable, going upstairs and leaving his son in charge of the place. I couldn’t remember him ever doing that, not when it was still light outside.
I stuck around for a while and helped Jonathan clean up the place. “Hey, I was going to ask you,” I said, “have you noticed anything unusual around here? Anybody snooping around?”
“Like who?”
“I don’t know. Just anybody out of the ordinary.”
“No, can’t say that I have. Although…”
“What?”
“It’s nothing.”
“What? What is it?”
“It was just today, when we got back here,” he said. “I went in the back door and it was like, I don’t know, something didn’t seem right.”
“You think somebody was in the house?”
“Well, remember, we had the cops all over the place this morning, so I figured I was still just kinda weirded out, you know what I mean? But when we got back, I’m walking up the steps, and I’m thinking, what is that smell? It was like cigar smoke or something.”
“Cigar smoke.”
“Yeah, but it was sweeter. You know what I mean?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“The door was locked,” he said. “How could somebody get in here?”
“I don’t know, Jonathan. I just don’t know.”
“Like we don’t have enough going on around here,” he said.
“I hear ya.”
“I know one thing,” he said. “I’m taking my deer rifle to bed with me tonight.”
“Do me a favor,” I said. “Keep it on the floor. Don’t actually put it in your bed, okay?”
He laughed at that one. I helped him finish up, said good night, and then headed out.
As I was driving back up to my cabins, the cell phone rang. I hoped it was Swanson, calling to see what the hell I was harassing him about, but instead it was Kenny.
“I just came home and heard your message,” he said. “What is it you wanted to talk to me about?”
“Thanks for calling me back,” I said. “I just wanted to ask you a couple of questions about the other night.”
“I don’t understand. We were both there. What would I know that you don’t already?”
“You know Vargas a lot better than I do,” I said. “I was hoping you might have some better insight.”
“I still don’t understand, Alex.”
“Are you aware that Jackie, Bennett, and Gill were all arrested today?”
There was a long silence on the line. “I knew something was up,” he finally said. “Win was in a pretty strange mood today.”
“He was at work today? You saw him?”
“Just for a few minutes. To tell you the truth, I’ve been avoiding him. Ever since that night, he’s been driving everybody crazy.”
I wanted to keep him talking, but I knew it would be better if I could ask him my questions in person. “Is there any chance of me coming down there?” I said. “I’d really appreciate it.”
“You really want to come all the way down here?”
“You’re in Bay Harbor, right? It’ll give me a chance to see it for myself.”
“I thought you hated this place.”
“I’ve never been inside,” I said. “I should give it a chance, right?”
“I don’t think you’re being straight with me, Alex…”
“Kenny, I’ve got three friends who got put in a jail cell today, and I’m just trying to help them. A few minutes of your time is all I ask.”
“All right, all right,” he said. “I’ll be here tomorrow morning. Just go to the front gate. I’ll give them your name.”
“You don’t have to work tomorrow?”
“I told you, he’s driving everybody crazy. It’s about time for a day off.”
“Nine o’clock okay?”
“Make it ten,” he said. “I’m going back out now. It might be a late night.”
I thanked him and hung up. It’s not the order I wanted to do this in, I thought. I’d rather get to Swanson first, work from the top down. But there’d still be plenty of time tomorrow to take another shot at him.
I stopped the truck in front of my cabin, sat there in the darkness for a while, listening to the engine cool down. The light from a three-quarter moon was shining through a break in the clouds, outlining the cabin against the woods behind it, this cabin built of pine logs thirty years ago by a retired auto worker and his baseball-player son. On this night it looked as lonely and forgotten as that abandoned railroad car over in Brimley.
A light was on inside. That wasn’t right. I did not remember leaving a light on.
I got out of the truck, went to the front door. It was unlocked. I pushed it open. The sweet smell of smoke hung in the air.
I stepped inside. I waited to hear something, anything, the sound of a foot falling, a word spoken, even a breath. There was nothing. Nobody was there. At least not at that moment.
There, in the center of the room, on my table…There were papers all over it. I took a step closer. I saw all of my bank statements, the stubs from my disability pension payments, my life insurance, even the deed to my land. It was all there, all of my financial records, my whole life, laid out on the table. Next to the papers was a saucer from my kitchen, with five cold cigar butts on it. They were those sickly sweet little cigars, the kind my father would take hunting to keep the bugs away. Somebody had been sitting right here in this chair, looking through these papers, smoking these cigars and using this saucer as an ashtray.
And this time, he wanted me to know it.
Chapter Thirteen
The next morning, I got up early enough to scope out Swanson’s office before heading down to Bay Harbor. I had put away all the papers the night before, and thrown away the cigar butts. But even with the windows open all night, there was still a hint of the smoke in the air. It was not a good way to start the day.
Swanson’s office was in the business district of the Soo, not far from Leon’s office. It was an old brick building on Augusta Street. Somebody had spent a few bucks making the outside of the place look like something out of the 1920’s, right down to the ornate gaslight fixtures on either side of the front door. Either business was going well, or Swanson knew how to fake it.
It was just before eight o’clock, so I didn’t figure to catch Swanson, not unless he was an early bird. I looked in through the door, hoping maybe I’d see his secretary, and really make her day by being the first person she got to talk to that morning. But no luck.