Already she is wishing she hadn’t made that call about being menaced by those guys. Why had she? Jim had gotten revenge, of a sort, by blowing up the vehicle. She knew the real reason had been the rape ordeal suffered by her friend, Paula Masters, at the hands of two other men. The culprits weren’t drifters, they were students, but that didn’t matter. Men dangerous to women were just that. — Hey, Harry, come in, she forces herself to sing, stepping into the house. He follows her, looking blankly at the art on the walls, into the lounge and, at her behest, sits down on the sofa.
Harry digs into his leather document case, producing two photographs, placing them on the table in front of her. — Was this them? The two men who harassed you?
There is no mistaking the duo. The criminal mugshots make them look even more like who and what they are; they could have been taken yesterday. The dark one, silent and menacing: the fair one, his face still set in that sneer. Melanie swallows, wishing she’d taken Jim’s advice. Why, why, why had she made that call? But all he’d done was blow up their car. .
She nods in acquiesence. — Have they been causing more trouble?
Harry acts as if she hasn’t spoken, going back into his document case, pulling out a typed sheet of paper. From where she sits, Melanie can’t make out what it pertains to, far less its specific contents. He lets the silence hang as he reads it. She interprets his behaviour as some kind of domin-ance statement.
Melanie had never been frightened to embrace who she was. She saw no need to apologise for her beauty or her wealthy background. She simply acknowledged that her family’s liberal values had bestowed on her a magnanimity and concern for others who navigated life in less ostentatious comfort than her, understanding that this relative affluence had also given her the breathing space to indulge her calling. Aware that her good looks got her both positive and negative attention, she had learned, with a calm assertiveness, how to deal with jocks and nerds and everything in between. You didn’t get sucked into the agendas of others. Ever.
But Harry’s mute longing had always grated on her. Like he was just hanging around, waiting on Melanie to validate his life with a smile or a ‘hello’ or even an ‘I love you’. Now he is silent again.
Melanie urges him to speak. — Harry?
— You said they were threatening, he coughs, taking out a small notebook from his trouser pocket.
She is getting it now. Harmless Harry with the notebook. They’re never harmless, ‘the polis’, Frank, no, Jim called them, commenting in glacial reserve after the first time she had introduced them, at an opening of her work. Harry had come along, as a guest of a mutual high school friend whom she resolved to have a quiet word with. What had Harry smelt off Jim? The criminality? The danger? Or even the art? Whenever she’d caught sight of him that evening, he wasn’t stealing the usual disconcerting glances at her. He was scrutinising Jim. Perhaps trying to fathom the attraction for women like Melanie, good-looking, intelligent and rich, of men whom he obviously reckoned were programmed to disappoint. Trying to discern their advantage over ones such as him, the loyal foot soldiers who only wanted to look after a woman. To provide for her. To save her. Melanie pondered how scary in their own way such men could be, without even knowing it. Often more so than many criminal psychopaths. Now Harry’s slow stare, his slightly awkward, goofy demeanour, as he asks her about the confrontation with those two troubling, troubled souls. — And Jim, how did he react?
— He was very calm, Melanie says, stretching out the word to relax herself. — He got me to take the kids to the car. Then he kinda faced those guys down, and followed us.
After some more scribbling, and another silence, Harry asks, drumming his pen on his notebook, — What did he say to them?
Melanie knows that this isn’t about those guys. She draws in a breath and feels the friction slip into her voice. — I don’t think he said a goddamn thing to those assholes. Why would he? Who were they?
Harry fastens his bottom lip over his top one, makes a smacking sound with his mouth. — A body was fished out of the sea. It got snagged on the rigging of Holly, the offshore oil platform, and was found by a maintenance worker. Otherwise the current would have taken it right out into the ocean. It was this guy, Marcello Santiago, a gang member and career criminal. He passes over one of the photographs again. The darker man, the one with the muscles, who had chillingly wanted to apply her suntan lotion. — He had a bad record, multiple felonies, including violence and rape. His associate, Damien Coover, with whom he was recently seen, and who is currently missing, is a known paedophile. You were lucky Jim was with you and the girls. Those guys are bad news. Well, in Santiago’s case, used to be.
Melanie gazes at Santiago’s picture. Her blood is gelid in her veins. The air-conditioning thermostat clicks on, blasting cool air into the room. She shudders. — He’s. . dead, she gasps. It was a silly thing to say, given that Harry has just explained that his body had been washed out to sea, but she is in shock.
But through that, Melanie is aware that she’s handed over some power to the police officer. To his credit, Harry pretends that he didn’t hear her stupid, inane remark. Instead, he looks down at his notebook. — Jim came back with you and the girls, yes?
— Yes, Melanie says, flinching. Then she goes into a shivering spasm, just as Harry looks up.
— Are you okay?
Melanie takes a deep breath and nods. — It’s scary to think that they were so close to the girls. . She looks back at the pictures on the table, regaining her composure. — What do you think happened?
— Well, we don’t have the official pathologist’s report yet, but initial examinations indicate multiple stab wounds.
— Oh my God, Melanie says, then maybe too quickly asks, — Do you think this guy’s murder was gang-related?
— Santiago’s dead, Coover’s vanished. Perhaps Coover killed him after some petty dispute and tried to make it look gang-related by taking him out to sea, but he never figured on Holly. . but you never really know with those guys, though. Harry tapped the pen on his notebook again. — They might have been high, had an argument, hell, whatever. . that strip of the beach is normally busy, but after Independence Day. . The full forensics report is due soon, he offers, then his tone changes. — But listen, Mel, it’s obviously not my job to jump to conclusions. I’m telling you this in confidence as a friend, he says, then pauses, looking hopefully at her.
Melanie is grateful, without knowing just how indebted he expects her to be. — I appreciate it, Harry.
— But I’m also being candid because I know that I can discuss this rationally with you, given your experience of men like those. . and he pauses again, as Melanie feels a ringing in her ears, — . . through your work.
— Thanks. .
— Anyway, those guys are no great loss, Harry says cheerfully, folding up the documents, — two very dangerous individuals, and he rises to his feet.
Melanie stands up too. — Yes, that was apparant by their behaviour.
— There’s another theory, he nods, scrutinising her reaction, — that Coover might be dead as well. So while these guys are dangerous, they were maybe not as dangerous as whoever took them out. If anybody did.
— Right, Melanie says. She can feel her mind starting to tumble, and knows that Harry is trying to read her again. She attempts to switch her thoughts to Devereux Slough, the marine life and those nesting terns that so interested Jim.