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When you talk you flinch, young man.
I m a little sore, Mr. Beamish.
Carousing on my dollar?
I unbuttoned my jacket, undid a couple of shirt buttons, and revealed
thebandages around my middle.
Broken ribs?
A few.
Same thing happened to me when I was in the army, he said. Not
combatheroics, I was stationed in Bayonne, New Jersey, and some Irish lout
from Brooklynbacked a Jeep right into me. But for the grace of a few inches,
I d have endedup childless, singing soprano, and voting Democrat.
I smiled.
Don t do that, he said. Got to hurt like hell.
Then don t be funny, I said.
He smiled. A real smile, devoid of scorn. Army doctors couldn t do a
damnthing to patch me, just wrapped the ribs and told me to wait. When I
mended,they shipped me off to the ETO.
No medical progress since then.
When did this happen to you? Not that I really care.
Two days ago. Not that it s any of your business.
He gave a start. Glared. Plucked brown fabric from his sunken chest. Brokeinto
arid laughter, coughed up more mucus. When the wheezing stopped, he said, How
about a drink? It s almost noon.
As I followed him through dim, dusty, high-ceilinged rooms full of
Georgianantiques and Chinese porcelain, he said, How d the other guy fare?
Worse than me.
Good.
We sat at a round table in his octagonal breakfast room, just off a
kitchenwhose stainless steel counters and chipped white cabinets said it
hadn t beenaltered for half a century.
Mullion windows looked out to a shade garden. The table was seasonedmahogany,
cigarette burned and water-marked, circled by four Queen Anne chairs.The wall
covering was a pale green silk Asian print, crowded with peonies andbluebirds
and fictitious vines, faded white in spots. A solitary framed photohung on the
wall. Black and white, also diminished by decades of ultraviolet.
When Beamish left to fetch the drinks, I took a look at the picture. Alanky,
light-haired young man in an army captain s uniform stood arm and armwith a
pretty young woman. Her cloche hat rested on dark curls. She wore afitted
summer suit and held a bouquet.
Big ship in the background. U.S.S. something. A fountain-penned caption inthe
lower right border read:4/7/45, Long Beach: Betty and Al. Back from the warat
last!
Beamish returned with a cut-crystal decanter and a pair of
matchingold-fashioned glasses, lowered himself to a chair slowly, struggling
to hidehis own wince. Then changing his mind.
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Eventually, he said, you don t need to be beat on to ache. Nature does
itall by her cruel self. He poured us each two fingers, slid my tumbler
acrossthe table.
Thanks for the encouragement. I held mine up.
He grunted and drank. I imagined Milo inforty years, hacking and swigging and
pronouncing about the sorry state theworld had gotten itself into. Old and
white-haired.
The fantasy ended when I got to heterosexual and rich.
Beamish and I drank. The whiskey was a single malt, peaty, sweetish goingdown,
with a nice after-burn that reminded you it was alcohol.
He licked the spot where his lips used to be, put his glass down. This isthe
good stuff, Lord knows why I brought it out.
Uncharacteristic burst of generosity, I said.
You re an insolent one none of the obsequiousness of a public servant.
I m not one. I m a psychologist.
A what no, don t answer, I heard you fine. One of those, eh? The fatdetective
sent you over here to deal with an unbalanced old fossil?
All my idea. I gave him a short explanation of my relationship to thepolice.
Expected the worst.
Beamish drank some more and tweaked the tip of his nose. When Rebecca diedI
saw no point in living. My children insisted I see a psychiatrist and sent
meto a Jewish chap in Beverly Hills.He prescribed pills I never took and
referred me to a Jewish woman psychologistin his office. I rejected her
out-of-hand as a high-priced babysitter but mychildren coerced me. Turned out,
they were right. She helped me.
I m glad.
Sometimes it s still difficult, he said. Too much damned space on
thebed ah, enough mawkishness, if we sit here too much longer you ll send me
abill. Here s the message I left the fat detective: A woman came by three
daysago, poking around that one s pile of logs.
Pointing in the general direction of Nora s house. I went over and askedher
what she was doing and she said she was looking for her cousin, Nora. Itold
her Nora hadn t been seen in a while and that the police may very well
suspectNora of nefarious activity. She didn t seem at all surprised by
thatpossibility is it Doctor ?
Alex is fine.
Did you cheat on your exams? he snapped.
No
Then you earned your damned degree, souse it, for God s sake. One thing
Idetest is the ersatz familiarity the beatniks ushered in. You and I may
bedrinking my best single malt, sir, but if you addressed me by my
Christianname, I d toss you out on your ear.
That would be painful, under the circumstances, I said.
He worked his lips. Conceded a smile. What s your family name?
Delaware.
Now, then, Dr. Delaware& wherewas I&
The cousin didn t seem surprised.
On the contrary, said Beamish. The possibility that Nora was undersuspicion
seemed downright syntonic. He grinned. A psychological term, Ilearned it
from Dr. Ruth Goldberg.
A-plus, I said. Any reason the cousin wasn t surprised?
I pressed her on that but she was not forthcoming. Quite the contrary, shewas
eager to leave and I had to prevail upon her to leave her name and
phonenumber.
Another slow rise from the table and a five-minute absence allowed me tofinish
my scotch. Beamish reappeared holding a piece of white paper folded to
atwo-inch square. Gnarled fingers labored at unfolding and smoothing.
Half a sheet of heavy-stock letterhead stationery.
Martin, Crutch, and Melvyn
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A Legal Corporation
Olive Streetaddress, long list of small-print names, Beamish s near the top.
At the bottom of the page, shaky handwriting in black fountain pen,
smearedaround the edges.
Marcia Peaty.A 702 number.
I looked it up, that s Las Vegas, said Beamish. Though she didn t seem like
the Vegas type.
She s the Dowds cousin?
So she said and it doesn t seem the kind of thing one would pretend.
Shewasn t particularly well-bred, but not vulgar, and nowadays that s
anaccomplishment
I refolded the paper. Thanks.
A little light just switched on in your eyes, Dr. Delaware. Have I been
useful?
More than you might imagine.
Would you care to tell me why?
I d like to but I can t.
As I started to rise, Beamish poured me another finger of scotch.
That sfifteen dollars worth. Don t sip standing up, terribly vulgar.
Thanks, but I ve had enough, sir.
Temperance is the last refuge of cowards.
I laughed.
He pinged the rim of his glass. It s absolutely necessary that you boltlike a
panicky horse?
I m afraid so, Mr. Beamish.
I waited for him to get to his feet.
He said, Later, then? Once you ve put them all away, would you let me
knowwhat I ve accomplished?
Them?
That one, her brothers nasty lot, just as I told you the first time you and
the fat detective came traipsing around.
Persimmons, I said.
That, of course, he said. But you re after more than purloined fruit.
CHAPTER 38
It took six minutes for the jail deputy to return to the phone.
Yeah, he s still here.
Please have him call me when he gets out. It s important.
He asked me for my name and number. Again. Said, Okay, but his tone
saiddon t count on it.
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