Night Game (15 page)

Esther Hirsch told me she would be happy to check with Jennifer Wilson, the medical examiner.

“She’s a friend,” she said. “I’ll be able to get it out of her. I would get it from the cops eventually anyway. Jen will just give me a sneak preview.”

“Great. Tell me about it tonight.”

“Seven o’clock.”

“Can I bring anything?”

“Just your appetite.”

“I can’t wait,” I said.

Then I called June Hoving. She agreed to meet at 11:00 and gave me directions to her house. It was in a part of town I didn’t know, on a side street parallel to Highway 19, the Gulf Coast’s main drag.

I missed the turn the first time and had to double back through the parking lot of a strip mall, built around the A-1 Veteran’s Buy and Sell Gun Shop and Practice Range: “We Aim to Please.” The bar next door was called Shooters. Really.

I was a bit early, so I pulled up and parked in front of the barred front door. I rang the bell and looked in. A large man came out from behind the stock shelves, looked me over, and buzzed me in from behind the counter.

“Good morning,” he said, cheerfully. “How can we help you today?”

Korea was his war, if indeed he was a vet. He was in late middle-age, sturdy, but fit-looking, with a grey crew-cut and quite a bit of healthy pink scalp showing through.

“Can I show you something in a lady’s pistol?” he asked.

I looked around at the cases and racks filled with more kinds of guns than I ever imagined existed. The cases were well-polished oak and sparkling glass. It had the reassuring look of an old-fashioned drugstore, and he the genial pharmacist, except for the instruments of death.

“Is this your store?”

“It is, indeedy, ma’am,” he said, sticking out his manicured hand. “Captain Harold T. Marshall, U.S. Army, retired, at your service.”

“You have a very nice shop,” I said. “But I’m not buying today. I’m just looking for a bit of information.”

“I surely hope I can help you,” he said.

“You see, I’m from Canada,” I said.

“Lovely country,” he said. “The wife and I were up there a few years ago. My goodness, it’s clean. Only they wouldn’t let me bring my guns across the border. I had to double back and leave them with my daughter in Buffalo.”

“Where did you visit?”

“Niagara Falls, first. We were there on our honeymoon, too, almost thirty-seven years ago now, just before I went overseas. It’s changed a lot since then, though. Not as nice, in my opinion.”

“Few things are,” I said.

“You’re right on the money there. Then we went to Stratford. My wife likes the plays. Next we went to a fishing camp up north aways and back down to Toronto to see our Titans play. We call ’em our Titans, too, don’t you know. We feel like they’re just hometown boys. Where are you from?”

“Toronto,” I admitted. “In fact, that’s my job, writing about the Titans.”

“You don’t say? You’re one of them women who go into the locker room and all?”

“Well, yes, that’s one part of my job.”

“It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” he said, shaking my hand again. “I have to tell you, I didn’t think it was proper when I first heard about it, but my wife and my daughter set me straight pretty quick.”

He laughed, and shook his head.

“They sure did set me straight,” he said.

“I’m glad,” I said.

“Well, I can’t wait to tell my wife I met you,” he said.

“Captain Marshall,” I began.

“Oh, excuse me. I’m so sorry. You had something to ask me, didn’t you. Of course you did.”

“Just a couple of questions.”

“Shoot,” he said, looking pleased with himself. “Get it? Shoot!”

“That’s a good one, Captain.”

“Always gets a laugh,” he chuckled.

“Can anybody buy a handgun in Florida?”

“Any Florida resident who is not a convicted felon or a person who has been institutionalized for mental illness is eligible to purchase firearms,” he recited.

“Being from Canada, where, as you know, handguns are pretty closely controlled . . .”

He nodded, looking sad.

“I don’t know much about them,” I continued. “Is a .38 revolver a popular model?”

He went to a case, unlocked it, and took out a gun.

“This is your Smith and Wesson .38-calibre revolver,” he said. “The basic model, the Police Special.”

I accepted it gingerly. I’d seen one like it before, on the shelf in the hall closet where Andy leaves his when he gets home, but I had never touched it. It weighed a couple of pounds, and was an ugly, menacing, blue-black colour, with a wooden handgrip. It gave me the creeps.

“This is the gun used by the Sunland Police Department and other law enforcement agencies throughout North America,” Marshall said. “I do believe the Toronto police force uses this gun.”

“Right again. Why is that?”

“It’s reliable,” he said. “Its effectiveness lies in that your Smith and Wesson .38 can really stop a human being.”

I put the gun down.

“What about for other people? Is it a popular gun with civilians?”

“It depends. Other guns are a bit flashier and fancier, they go in and out of fashion like clothes. Those would be your automatics, Berettas and such. Every time a new spy movie comes out, we get a run on whatever guns are in it. But the Police Special sells well year-in and year-out. It’s timeless.”

Like a good tweed suit, I thought, or the basic black cocktail dress.

“Now, that’s the standard gun, with the four-inch barrel. There are more deluxe models, of course. There, in the case, it’s the same gun, but it has the chrome finish and the eight-inch barrel. It’s accurate, but a bit showy, and definitely too much gun for a woman, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Looks like something I had with caps in it when I was a kid,” I said. “How do you tell the standard guns apart? Where is the serial number?”

He picked the gun up and turned it over to show me the letters and numbers stamped into the bottom of the butt.

“And if you don’t want it to be traced, you file that off, right?”

“That’s what you see on most of your illegal guns, yes.”

“What about those? Illegal guns?” I asked. “Are they hard to come by around here?”

“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” he said, all business, the sparkle gone.

“What if someone who wasn’t a resident needed a pistol?”

“He couldn’t buy it here.”

“Where would he go?”

“Well, he could buy it privately, I suppose. There’s nothing illegal about that. He might pick one up at a swap meet.”

“A swap meet?”

“Sure, or a garage sale. No problem there. Are you sure you’re not interested?”

“No, guns scare me,” I said.

“You shouldn’t be scared of guns,” he said. “It’s not the guns, it’s the people using them you got to worry about.”

“Of course,” I said. “I really appreciate your help, Captain. It has been very interesting talking to you.”

“Any time, little lady,” he said. “And you take care of those Titans, you hear? You know, some of them are personal friends of mine.”

“Really?”

“Why, sure. They come in here, and I’m able to help them out a bit, give them a little break on the price.”

He gestured to a wall of photos I hadn’t noticed before. I went closer to inspect them. There he was, Captain Harold T. Marshall, retired, shaking hands with Red O’Brien, the former manager; riding a golf-cart with Stinger Swain; posing at the ballpark with Joe Kelsey and Tiny Washington; deep-sea fishing with Archie Griffin and Flakey Patterson; even the late Steve Thorson was there, photographed with the captain at the target range. There were other ballplayers I recognized from other teams that train along the coast, and shots of Marshall posed with any number of dead animals to round off the hall of fame.

“Not that I’ve sold guns to all those fellows, mind you,” he said.

“What about Stinger Swain?” I asked, pointing to his picture.

“He’s been a customer,” he said. “Of course, he’s from Georgia, out-of-state, so I haven’t been able to sell him a gun. But he has bought ammunition, and uses the range sometimes, him and the missus. He’s quite the hunter, you know.”

“I’d heard that,” I said. “A lot of them seem to be.”

“Well, it’s relaxing,” he said. “And peaceful. These ballplayers need that after the season is over, getting away from the stress and all.”

“I guess so,” I said, dubious. “I always wonder why they don’t just go back to their families. I would think they would miss that.”

“Well, family life can take some getting used to after the season, too, I guess,” he said. “In some cases it’s probably better that the husband goes away for a week or two.”

“You could be right, Captain,” I said. “Thanks again for all your help.”

“My pleasure, miss,” he said. “Call in any time.”

Fat chance of that, I thought, sweet as he was.

June Hoving’s street was small and cramped. There were no sidewalks, and the lawns, such as they were, were a far cry from the putting greens in more affluent parts of town. The cars in the driveways were junkers, not Cadillacs, some of them up on blocks. But it was livelier, and more friendly. You could tell people really lived there. A bunch of kids were horsing around with their bicycles on a lawn. At another house, a woman was working in the garden, which had one of those wooden standup cut-outs of a bending-over bum in a polka-dot dress. It was tacky, maybe, but full of life.

I found the Hoving house without too much trouble. It looked tidy but in need of paint. There was a small garden, and some flowering bushes, growing out of control. Back by the garage I saw a vintage Corvette, gleaming red and white. A pair of legs, wearing jeans and cowboy boots, stuck out from underneath the open passenger door. Ringo, the mechanic, I assumed.

June was at the door when I got there. She looked more comfortable than the last two times I had seen her, dressed in jeans and a tie-dyed T-shirt. Her hair was loose and freshly washed, thick and curly like Lucy’s, but with quite a bit of grey. She looked younger and more attractive in casual clothes.

I followed her into the house. She seemed nervous.

“My husband’s not here,” she said. “I’m not sure if you wanted to talk to him, too.”

“That’s fine,” I said. Even though I wanted another look at him after hearing Hank’s story I knew I would get more out of June without an audience.

“Can I get you something? I’ve just made a fresh pot of coffee.”

“That would be lovely;” I said.

When she went to the kitchen, I looked around the living room, a clean, comfortable place dominated by a large television set in one corner. The couch was covered with the kind of Indian-cotton pattern bedspread I hadn’t seen since the late sixties. There were also large cushions on the floor, covered with the same stuff. The walls were painted deep red, and hung with framed posters. It was a cheery room, and reminded me of places I had lived as a university student. The smell did, too, sandalwood incense not quite masking the marijuana.

June came back into the room, carrying a tray with two pottery mugs of coffee and a matching sugar bowl and cream jug. She put the tray on the round brass table between a pair of armchairs by the window. We sat and busied ourselves with doctoring our coffees, then I put my tape recorder on the table.

“I hope you don’t mind,” I said. “It saves me having to take notes. And it prevents me from misquoting you.”

“That’s fine,” she said, though she looked dubious.

“Did Lucy live here?” I asked.

“No, she moved out a few years ago, into an apartment behind the new mall,” she said.

“How often did you see her?”

“A lot,” she said. “She would come by here or I’d go over there or she’d drop into the restaurant. We were very close.”

“Why did she move out?”

“She wanted her independence.”

“There were no problems, then?”

“Well, she and Dirk really didn’t get along that well,” June said. “Don’t be writing that, though. We just decided it would be better for everyone if she was on her own.”

“You kept up with what she was doing, though.”

“We didn’t have any secrets from each other.”

“Just from your husband.”

“Well, yes,” she said.

I waited for her to go on. Silence is sometimes more effective than a question. Finally, she sighed.

“Dirk is a good man, a good husband. But he was never a father before. Lucy and Ringo and I had been alone for a long time before I met Dirk, and we had our own ways. I trust them both. Lucy was no angel, but she was responsible. I figured that she could make up her own mind. Dirk couldn’t accept that. He laid down a lot of rules that she wouldn’t follow. He treated her like a child, and she couldn’t stand that.”

“He was too rigid,” I said.

“Exactly. He expected too much of her. It was pretty awful before she moved out. I hated the day she left, but I also realized it was for the best. Things have been better since then. Yeah, Dirk’s a bit rigid, but I can live with it. I don’t mind. I prefer a more settled life now, to tell the truth. Besides, he travels a lot, so I can do what I like.”

“He’s a trucker?”

“Yes, long-distance hauler. That’s where he is now. Another one of the drivers called in sick, so he had to take a rig up to Detroit. He’ll be gone a few days.”

“Couldn’t he have found someone else? You shouldn’t be left alone right now.”

“I don’t mind, really. I prefer it, if you want to know the truth. There’s been too much praying going on around here for the last few days. I’ve had to beat off the well-meaning church people with a stick.”

“He is a religious man, I understand,” I said.

“Born-again five years ago, now,” she said.

“And you?”

“I went through the deal for him, because it meant a lot, but I don’t take it too seriously. I figure it’s what Dirk needs to keep himself under control. It has been a big help in his life, and that’s good. As for me, I don’t really need it.”

“What about Ringo?”

“What about him? You mean is he born-again? No. He works for Dirk’s trucking company. You know about that, right? Trucking for Jesus. Kind of embarrassing, if you ask me. Anyway, Ringo just works there.”

“What about his relationship with his stepfather?”

“Dirk was never as tough on him, I guess because he’s a boy. A man. Dirk has different standards for men and women. Besides, Ringo isn’t like Lucy. He just likes working on cars and hanging around with the guys.”

“Your former husband told me he saw quite a bit of Lucy in recent years,” I said. “Did you know about that?”

She looked very surprised.

“Hank Cartwright? No, I didn’t know that. She never told me. Are you sure?”

“That’s what he said. She saw him once a week.”

“I never knew.”

“Does it bother you?”

“Well, yeah. Geez. I mean it bothers me that she never told me. Why did she think she had to keep it a secret? I wouldn’t have minded. Hank’s okay, just a bit pathetic.”

She laughed.

“Can you turn that thing off? I’d just like to talk a bit, not for the interview. Do you mind?”

I switched off the tape recorder.

“I don’t have a lot of women friends,” she explained. “Just people at work, and I don’t like to talk to them about personal stuff.”

“I understand that,” I said.

“What’s funny about her seeing Hank is that she isn’t his daughter,” she said.

It was my turn to be surprised.

“Of course, she didn’t know that. Neither did he, and I wasn’t going to tell either of them. So if she was looking for her father, she was looking in the wrong place. Funny, huh?”

“Does her real father know?”

“That he’s her father? I never told him. Maybe he suspects,” she shrugged. “I never saw any reason to tell him. I didn’t expect him to do anything about it. I wanted to be with Hank back then anyway. Lucy was just a one-night mistake.”

“You’re sure about this.”

“Oh, yeah. I knew when it was I got pregnant, and Hank wasn’t around right then. He was out west for a month.”

We both lit cigarettes.

“I realized I was pregnant after he got back. It was close enough that it could have been his, within a couple of weeks. So I just let him think it was.”

“That’s understandable, if you wanted to be with him.”

“Those were different times. We were all stoned all the time. Sex was no big deal. We weren’t into fidelity.”

“Sex, drugs, rock and roll, and living for the moment,” I said. “Be here now.”

“You got it,” she laughed. “I guess Lucy took after me. Promiscuity runs in the family. She did not give a flying fuck, excuse me, what other people thought. I was just like her at that age. Except Lucy was smart enough not to get pregnant. The pill was harder to get back then. You’re about my age, right? Remember? You had to get your parents’ permission then, and there was no way I could ask my mom that. But Lucy? Hell, as soon as she began to date, I went and got her her own prescription.”

“I remember those days too,” I said. “Major anxiety, once a month.”

“Fun, wasn’t it?”

We laughed together.

“But we were lucky on one thing,” she said. “The worst thing we could catch was a dose of the clap.”

“I know. I’m glad I’m not a teenager these days. Or a parent of one.”

“Lucy and I used to talk about safe sex all the time,” she said. “Not that it did any good. She got herpes anyway. Said she forgot, or they didn’t have any condoms, or the guy liked it better without.”

“Of course, because they know they’re invincible. Bad things happen to other people.”

Suddenly she began to cry.

“Shit,” she said. “It’s just so damn unfair.”

I watched her pain and cursed myself.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Not your fault,” she said. She got up and left the room, but came back a moment later with a fistful of tissues.

“I should put a box of these in every room these days,” she said, then wiped her eyes and blew her nose. “Every time I think about her, I just start to bawl.”

“It’s not surprising,” I said, feeling useless. “It’s going to take a while.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever get over it. Lucy was everything to me. I don’t know how I will live without her.”

She looked at me quickly.

“Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “I’m not going to do anything drastic. I’m a survivor. But I don’t expect any happiness in my future.”

The side door banged, and Ringo stood in the doorway, greasy from his work.

“Mom? You all right?”

“Fine, Ringo. Everything is fine.”

“I’m going over to Bud’s for a while, okay?”

“Yes. Just call if you’re going to miss dinner.”

“I’ll be back before then,” he said, then disappeared towards the back of the house. We could hear him going to the bathroom. She rolled her eyes at me, and we both laughed.

“Close the damn door,” she yelled. “We’ve got company.”

Sound of door closing, muffled apology, followed by a flush. Two minutes later, he was out the door.

She blew her nose again, then looked at me.

“I need a beer. Will you have one with me?”

“I wouldn’t say no.”

“Good. Bring your stuff into the kitchen.”