Part 9 (1/2)

It was a long afternoon. Bailey had come and gone; he had made a show of checking out the security system, but Frank suspected that he had been loitering while searching for an excuse to bring up the subject of father spying on daughter. Bailey did not approve.

He thought about Will Thaxton, then shrugged. So she had a date with an old friend. He knew Will Thaxton and remembered that Barbara had debated the socks off him when they were both still in high school. He doubted very much that anything would come of their getting together again now after so many years. Thaxton had been married twice, and he was only forty. Not a good record as far as Frank was concerned. Meanwhile, whoever Barbara's client was might be feeling neglected; as far as he could tell, there had been no contact.

Several times he started to call her, then walked away from the phone. Usually on Sat.u.r.day or Sunday they had dinner together. He enjoyed cooking for her and suspected that it was the only decent meal she ate from one weekend to the next, but it would be too awkward now.

When would it stop being awkward? he asked himself then, thinking of the weeks ahead, the months if she had a client charged with murder.

He cursed and moved away from the back door. The plastic tub of worms was on the back porch, and he decided to go buy a G.o.dd.a.m.n worm bin.

13.

On Monday morning when Frank entered his firm's office, Patsy was waiting for him. More often than not, that meant bad news, but this time she was smiling, showing every tooth in her head.

”Our book came!” she said.

He grinned. ”Let's have a look,” he said, motioning toward his office. She followed him, carrying the mail and a large UPS parcel.

Together at his desk they admired the work. It kept changing, Frank thought, bemused. Sc.r.a.ps of notes, pages and pages of testimony, more notes, then chapters... It was ready for the index and the chapter notes. And those inclusions would change it again.

Patsy said she would photocopy the proofs; since she had the disks with the text and the chapter notes and index references, she could get right on it. ”I think that program might even be worth the money,” she said as she walked from the office.

A few minutes later, Frank began to scan the first page, then to read it, and after a few minutes he took the whole stack to the other side of the office, sat in a comfortable chair, and read in earnest. Now and then he chuckled or shook his head in renewed disbelief. He read one of Barbara's cross-examinations and said softly, ”d.a.m.n, she's good!”

He walked home for lunch, then, restless, returned to the office, thinking he might as well finish reading the page proofs. His editor did not want him to make any further changes, but Frank had come across a section or two that could use a little more explanation.

Late that afternoon Milt Hoggarth called. ”My motto,” Milt said, ”try the office first on the very slight chance that you'll be there. Okay if I drop in around five or so?”

”You have that autopsy report?”

”Yes. But I can't get away until a little after five. Or it can keep until morning.”

''I'll wait for you.”

After he hung up and tried to read some more, he found that he could not concentrate on the words any longer. He stalked around his office, out to the wide corridor lined with doors, most of them closed. He went to the lounge and got a cup of coffee, then stopped at Patsy's closed door and tapped.

”Who is it?” she asked. She sounded cross.

”Just me,” he said, opening the door. She was frowning hard, glaring at her monitor.

”Having a problem?” he asked.

”No,” she snapped. Her fingers were poised over the keyboard. ”Well, don't put your eyes out with that stuff. I'll wait for Milt and then take off. Leave anytime you want to.”

”In a minute,” she said. Her eyes kept straying from him back to the monitor, and it seemed that any second her fingers would begin to work without her.

Frank retreated.

At ten minutes past five Milt showed up. ”Busy day,” he said, sinking into one of the clients' chairs by the desk. He eyed the stacks of papers and grimaced. ”Paperwork. G.o.d, if they'd just eliminate the paperwork, I'd be a happy man.” He tossed more papers down on the desk. ”Doc Steiner's report. There's nothing in it, Frank. She was on a maintenance drug for her diabetes, and she took a fairly mild sleeping pill, a muscle relaxant. That's all. She stopped breathing and her heart stopped beating. No struggle, no puncture marks, no convulsions, no vomit, no mucus, nothing. Doc says it goes like that sometimes with diabetes. She had the muscle relaxant in her blood. Toxicology reports will tell us how much, or if there was anything else, but Doc says not. He doesn't like it any more than you do, but that's how it is. Nothing for us.” He was watching Frank closely. ”Unless you give me a reason not to, I'm closing it out.”

Frank shook his head. ”I saw her a few days before she died; she looked well and acted well. And she was careful with medications. She wouldn't have taken more dope than was safe for her to handle.”

”You know how that goes, Frank. You take one and nothing happens, and after a while you take one or two more. What was she so worked up about?”

”Nothing that would make her reckless with medications. She had too much to live for.”

”Frank, we're not suggesting she did it on purpose. I'll send someone out to take off the police seal tomorrow, and I brought her personal stuff, purse, keys and safe-deposit key for you, the prescription containers, a receipt for what Doc tested. Her folks can claim the body. It's closed, Frank.” He stood up and put a plastic bag on the desk.

”I'll break the d.a.m.n seal myself,” Frank muttered.

Milt shrugged. ”Be my guest.”

Frank read the autopsy report: no bruises, no needle marks, no contusions, nothing. ”But you don't just lie down and die,” he said uneasily. At his age that sometimes happened, but not at fifty-three.

He went home and changed his clothes, and worked for a short time in the garden. The rain had already brought up weeds. He picked some peas and lettuce, pulled a few new red potatoes out from under a thick mulch, then made dinner. When he realized he was pus.h.i.+ng his food around on his plate, he forced himself to eat.

Afterward, he picked up a book, put it down, turned on the television, turned it off, considered going to bed early, but it was no use, he decided; he would go break that d.a.m.n seal and have a look around Hilde's house for himself.

At nine he entered the little house and stood for a moment inside the front door, bewildered by the brightness. The drapes were closed.... He looked up and saw a skylight. The lowering sun made the room as bright as outside. He walked through the living room into the kitchen, everything very clean and neat, flowers turning brown in a vase out here; there were irises curling up and turning black in a bowl in the living room. Books on shelves in both rooms. He didn't stop to examine anything closely; for now he wanted to get a feel for the house, for how Hilde had lived. He remembered Geneva's words ”the house was full of silence and emptiness.” He could feel that at the moment. Sometimes his own house felt this way.

He glanced inside a bathroom, then went through a hall into a room that had been used as an office. More books, every room had shelves and bookcases, all filled. And when they overflowed, she packed up a box of books and took them to her mother and sister. As before, he didn't linger to go through the room carefully. Light from the skylight didn't reach this far; the room was shadowy.

He felt a change in the air, a draft, or a s.h.i.+ft of the light, something; he started to turn to the door and was in motion when something hit him in the head. Stunned, he reeled into the wall, then fell to the floor. He could hear someone shouting, and running footsteps.

Groggily he started to pick himself up, then hands were on him and someone was saying, ”Mr. Holloway, don't move. I'll call an ambulance.”

”No ambulance,” Frank said hoa.r.s.ely. ”Just help me get up.”

The other man got him to his feet, and then helped him back to the kitchen, where Frank sat down. ”Chris....” he said.

”Romano, sir. Chris Romano. Maybe we should call your doctor?”

”No. Nothing's broken.” He was feeling his head, just behind his ear. ”Maybe some ice,” he said. He was certain nothing was broken, but already soreness was setting in from head to toe.

Then, holding a towel-wrapped plastic bag filled with ice against his head, he leaned back and closed his eyes while Chris Romano had a look outside.

Almost magically Bailey was saying, ”Don't fall asleep. You don't want to go to sleep right now.”

Right, he thought. A concussion. Something about a concussion and staying awake. He jerked wide awake as Barbara said, ”Dad, open your eyes.”

He opened his eyes to see her kneeling at his side, as white as snow. She examined his face, even felt his pulse, and then she was hugging him hard as he said again and again, ”It's all right, Bobby. I'm not hurt. It's all right.” She was trembling all over.

”Let's go to the other room,” she said. ”Do you need more ice?”

They wanted to make sure he could walk, he understood, and he rose carefully, held on to the chair back for a moment, then walked to the living room, where he sat on the sofa. Oh, yes, he thought, he was surely going to be sore.