PART 1
ELEVEN
"Boy, if you thought that one was crazy, listen to this one."
It was 2 a.m. We should've been asleep. We'd stopped at an all-night grocery and bought some hamburger and buns and onions, ketchup and mustard and pickles. She said that making love always made her feel domestic. She also bought a couple of magazines, and that's what we were doing now that we'd eaten and made love a second time - a much more ferocious outing this time - sitting naked in the middle of my bed with two Luckies burning in an ashtray and "Johnny's Greatest Hits" playing low in the background.
She was reading from an "Advice For Teenagers" column, and the exchange was hilarious.
"The name of this one is 'What to Tell Your Teen-Age Daughter About Sex.' You ready, McCain?"
"Ready."
"'Question: Boys say they don't want their wives to be virgins any more. Is virginity out of date? Answer: The sex act is often painful at first and not pleasurable at all. Therefore if you have sexual intercourse at an early age you may be frightened and disgusted by it - and never marry.'"
"Oh, my God," I said, "you'll probably end up a lesbo." Lesbo was a word you encountered in a lot of Midwood and Beacon paperbacks, the really steamy ones. Lesbo Lust, Lesbo Love, Lesbo Loonies. You know the kind of book. The ones you won't admit you read.
"Here's another good one, McCain. This has very specific advice. 'Question: Is there a perfect good night kiss for teenage girls? Answer: Yes, ten seconds - not too long and not too hard.'"
"I'll refrain from commenting on that not-too-long, not-too-hard thing."
"Oh, listen to this!" She was already laughing even before reading it. "'Question: Is there one type of girl that just about every boy likes? Answer: Yes, indeed. Boys like girls who are peppy and wide awake and who like to have fun.'"
And then the phone rang.
The cats, who'd been sleeping at the foot of the bed, jumped up like a gymnastic team. I had about the same reaction. I'd been so entranced by this sexual advice that the ring scared the hell out of me.
She looked frightened by it. Drew away from it.
I grabbed the receiver. Listened.
Disguised voice. No sex. No accent. No identifiable intonation.
"The old blacksmith barn, McCain. Check it out."
And hung up.
"Who was that?"
"Somebody who's seen a lot of mystery movies."
"What?"
"He or she wants me to check out an old barn on the east edge of town. By the old dam."
"Did the person say why?"
"That's rule number one in mystery movies: Anonymous calls should always be as mysterious as possible."
She stubbed out her cigarette. "Did you ever think somebody might just be having fun?"
"Not after midnight. After midnight you have to get a city permit to fool me."
She said, "Damn."
"What?"
She pointed at her head. "Depression."
"About what?"
"Depression and guilt, actually. The killer combo. My brother's not two days dead, and here I am in somebody's bed. And having a great time."
I stood up and pulled my shirt from the chair where I'd draped it. "C'mon. Depression has a hard time with moving targets."
"We're going to the old barn?"
"Thought we might."
"You're crazy, you know that?" she said.
"Yeah. But at least I'm not depressed."
***
In legend, the first blacksmith in these parts was a Plains Indian said to have mystical powers. It was a nice story, but according to town records the first blacksmith was a guy named Louis J. Nordberg, Jr., who later ran for mayor. If he had mystical powers he kept them to himself. Yet whenever there was a town pageant of any kind, they dragged in this Indian named Night Star, who banged away at his anvil and spoke to ghosts. I guess it was better than Louis J. Nordberg, Jr., at that.
When I was growing up, the blacksmith barn was used for livestock auctions. A couple hundred pickup trucks could be seen surrounding the pens twice a month, and an auctioneer who talked so fast I couldn't understand him strolled around in Western clothes and white Stetson, tilting his microphone like a crooner on Ed Sullivan.
Now it was a huge cattle barn laid out with bleachers and a show pen. The wood had begun to rot, and the smell of decaying timber combined with ghostly traces of dung to create a definitely unwelcome odor. You could still hear the sad, confused animals and the whine of Hank Williams played over the loudspeaker if you were attuned to the paranormal radio station that sometimes plays in my mind.
There were a number of stay out signs posted. The doors were all padlocked sturdily.
"You bring a gun?" Natalie said, clutching my arm, shivering as much because of the creepy barn as because of the chill. There was even some ground fog rolling in. Pretty soon we'd have ourselves a drive-in horror movie.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because if I bring a gun, somebody's likely to get shot."
"I thought all private eyes carried guns."
"Only the ones in the private eye union. I don't have enough money to join."
There was a boarded-up window that kids had pried open. The board came loose the moment I touched it. This told me that the kids of Black River Falls are as indomitable as ever, God love them. Crawl in and out of the barn but always put the board back in place so that it looks closed up. And people wondered where our future political leaders were coming from.
Inside, the wet-timber old-cow-dung smell was even worse. It had the same suffocating effect of being in a small closet filled with mothballs.
I'll spare you the tour we took. Nothing. The smells got worse. She clutched my arm tighter. We kissed a couple of times. And then I excused myself to do something people rarely do in mysteries when they're single-mindedly looking for clues: I stopped to take a leak. That's something you don't see very much of in Agatha Christie.
When we resumed our nothing search, I remembered the auctioneer's booth up in the corner. It was like the broadcaster's booth at a stadium. The auctioneer sat up there with his Pepsi and his Pall Malls and commented on all the beautiful animals being led into the pen.
The booth itself was the size of a prison cell. The auctioneer sat on one of three folding chairs at a booth-long counter for his microphone and made his announcements. On the wall, a ten-year-old poster announced the fact that on June 30, 1949, Mr. Roy Rogers and his horse Trigger would be appearing right here for the delight and wonderment of the entire family. I remembered that afternoon. I'd had a hell of a time until Trigger had a herculean bowel movement just when Roy was making him show off a little. That's the nice thing movies have over reality; you can always do another take. Most of our lives are in dire need of another take.
The booth had been used recently. Natalie pointed out a Pepsi bottle with the new Pepsi logo; I pointed out Cavalier cigarette butts in an ancient ashtray. The tobacco was still fresh. And then, as I played my light over the wall, we both saw it: blood spatters.
Richard Conners staggering out of the foggy night, not knowing where he'd been the past forty-eight hours. A head wound of some kind, blood all over his scalp.
A crime scene. That's what we were looking at. A man had been kidnapped and brought here. But why? I was able to answer that question a few minutes later when, crawling around on the floor with my flashlight, I saw a small plastic cap. I wasn't sure what it was. I showed it to Natalie.
"That's the protective cap they put on a hypodermic needle."
