Right To Die - Jeremiah Healy (31 page)

What about the police?

"Ballistics couldn't do a lot with the slugs.
Based on the alloy, they think it was older ammunition, though."

Older?

"Yes."

Is that helpful?

"Depends. If we can come up with another slug,
they might be able to tell they came from the same batch and maybe
even the same weapon. On the other hand, there haven't been any more
notes since the shots were fired."

What about the gay man who . . .

"He's been doing pretty well, I think. He left a
message for me to call him early this week. I've tried three times
since, but his answering service says he's out of the office for a
few days. The professor isn't due back from the West Coast till
April, so everything else is kind of on hold for another month."

Does that mean you and Nancy can enjoy the parade
today at Chuck's house?

"I will. Nancy's working on a murder one, which
means we're just going to have dinner together afterward at my
place."

So you're going to the party stag?

"Not exactly."

Not exactly?

"There's somebody I
think could use some cheering up."

* * *

Inés Roja tugged on the bottom of her green sweater.
"I have never seen a St. Patrick's Day parade."

I inched the Prelude through the traffic just east of
the veterinary clinic. "I thought New York staged a pretty big
one?"

"I never knew anyone to go with before."

The last time I'd checked in with Roja about notes
and Maisy Andrus, the secretary had apologized for not being more
available. She'd been putting in extra time with the vet because
another volunteer had been sick. I'd asked her if that included
Sundays. Inés said yes, but just in the morning. Knowing Nancy
couldn't make it, I'd insisted over Roja's protestations that I'd be
over to get her. At noon, in green.

I said, "Nice sweater."

Inés looked at me solemnly, as if to see if I was
kidding. Apparently satisfied, she said, "Filene's Basement. A
wonderful place."

I persuaded two barricades of cops to let us through
on the strength of the address printed on our invitation. Chuck was
born into the Lithuanian enclave in South Boston, his dad a marine
wounded on Guadalcanal. Chuck left the city, making his fortune by
wise investments. He returned to buy a huge white house occupying one
of the few large pieces of land in Southie. A piece of land at the
intersection where the parade wheels ninety degrees.

A big Irish flag in green, white, and orange rippled
in the breeze over Chuck's front door. I parked the Prelude in his
long driveway. As I killed the engine, Roja said, "Please don't
leave me alone with people."

"I won't."

As it turned out, Inés was the hit of the party, a
mixture of fifty or sixty people, only half of whom were descended
from the Emerald Isle. We ate superb corned beef, drank enough Harp
to float a PT boat, and got tours of the renovated house from Chuck
himself, a rangy guy in a chartreuse shirt and cowboy hat. I took
some good-natured ribbing about Nancy and heard Inés laugh for the
first time, a merry, musical sound.

A whoop spread through the first floor, a lead
element of the parade just reaching our corner. We joined the others
carrying green beer and stronger spirits into the cold. Standing on
the lawn, everyone applauded the bands and toasted the heroes and
jeered the politicians. In between targets there were good stories
and silly jokes and painful attempts to affect a brogue.

Back inside, folks opted for coffee and soft drinks
to dilute the alcohol. As the party broke up around five, Inés and I
said good-bye to Chuck, she helping me jockey the Prelude around the
couple of cars that were staying later.

Stopping for a traffic light on Summer Street, Inés
made a purring noise, then gave a tempered version of the merry
laugh. "That was a wonderful party, John."

"It's a good time."

"The parade. You went to it every year?"

"When I was in the city. Even during Vietnam,
when there wasn't much support for things military, the parade was a
big thing because every block in the neighborhood had somebody in the
service, many of them overseas."

"Tell me, from when you were a little boy, do
you remember the parade the same way?"

"No, not really. I remember it being bigger and
sharper and better. But I think that's just a function of growing
up."

"Yes. Yes, you are right. We remember as better
the things from when we were young."

I was about to keep the conversation going when I
noticed a tear running down Roja's left cheek. I turned back to the
windshield and watched the traffic instead.

At the Andrus house I pulled onto the sidewalk and
came around to open the passenger door.

Inés got out and stood tall, still blinking away
tears. Looking up into my eyes, she said, "That was the best
time I have had in many years, John. If only . . ."

At which point Roja shook
her head and pushed past me, fumbling out a key to open and close the
front door as fast as she could.

* * *

"You didn't have enough at Chuck's?"

I took the wineglass from Nancy's hand. "Just
carbos so far today."

" 'Carbos'?"

"Bread and beer."

"I hope you're learning more about running than
you have about nutrition." She pushed the sleeves of a
cowl-necked sweater up to her elbows. Topping off her glass, she
raised it. "To St. Patrick?"

"Not after work kept you from the party. How
about 'To forever'."

Nancy clinked her glass against mine with that half
smile that makes a little ping in my chest. "To forever."

A minute later I had two hands on the steak tray,
aiming it for the oven, when the phone rang in the living room.

"Nance, can you get that?"

"Sure."

I centered the steaks and flipped the dial to Broil.
I was just setting the timer when Nancy's head came around the
corner, minus the smile.

"It's Del Wonsley."
 

=27=

THE MEDICAL FACILITY WAS ONE I'D NEVER HEARD 0F,
TUCKED away in the Longwood Avenue area near Brigham's and Women's
Hospital. I found the right floor and suite, but the door was closed.

"John."

I turned around as Del Wonsley got up from a tub
chair. Closing the current Newsweek, he looked bushed. "Thank
you for coming. It'll only be a minute. They're . . . treating just
now."

"What happened?"

Wonsley dropped the magazine onto the seat behind
him. "AIDS leaves you open for a lot of complications. The
diabetes is playing yo-yo with his waking hours. Usually these things
are pretty predictable, but this episode is lasting longer than the
others. So, Alec wanted to be sure to see you."

Wonsley read my face and managed a smile. "No,
no. I think he's going to pull through this time. Weaker, but he'll
make it. It's just that in seeing you now, Alec is playing the
percentages?

"Is there anything I can do?"

"Be straight with him. No hearts and flowers.
Just talk business or whatever, like he was laid up with a broken leg
and had to meet people here as an inconvenience."

The suite door opened. A black female nurse with a
round face came out. She held a metal pan, discreetly shrouded by a
towel to conceal the contents. An East Indian female doctor followed
the nurse and beckoned to Wonsley. They moved off to talk, Wonsley
coming back as the doctor continued briskly on her way.

"You can go in now, John. But only a few
minutes, all right?"

"Come get me if I overstay my welcome."

Wonsley went back to the chair.

I knocked, heard something, and went in.

They would have to invent a new kind of bleach to
make the sheets whiter than his face.

Alec Bacall nodded to me, one fist compressing a
little sponge ball. The arm had a clear plastic tube in it, some
not-so-clear liquid pulsing downward and into him. I moved closer.

His eyes strained from the sockets, sunken and
shriveled. The flesh sagged at his jawline, bruises of purple and
blue providing the only color on the bed. I'd seen Bacall at his
office in January, eight weeks before. Given the changes, it could
have been eight years.

"Alec."

He nodded again. "I'd say sit, but Del probably
told you not to stay that long."

"Just as well. I've been tossing down booze all
day at a St. Pat's party."

The eyes went left-right-left. "God, I've lost
track of that sort of thing. You and Nancy went to the parade?"

I told him about Inés.

"Good, good. She needs that, and more."
Something moved inside Bacall, a brief spasm traversing his face as
well as his body.

Then, "About Maisy?"

"She's back in San Diego. No notes since
February. No progress, either, I'm afraid."

"What do you make of the notes starting and
stopping like that?"

"I don't know, Alec. It must be that the guy
knows her movements, including major events like arriving in and
leaving Boston. It could be that she's carrying her trouble with
her."

"I don't understand."

I explained my views on Tucker Hebert and Manolo.

Bacall lolled his head from side to side on the
linen. "I don't know much about investigating people, but I
think I do know something about judging them. It just can't be Manolo
or Tuck, John."

"I don't see many other prospects right now."

"Will you stay with it?"

"As long as I'm needed. Or wanted."

"Thank you." Bacall's pupils wandered, and
his eyes closed. I'd almost turned to go when the lids rose. "John?"

"Yes?"

"I said I was a good judge of people, but
sometimes being too close blurs the vision. How do you think Del is
doing?"

"He's still smiling."

A forced laugh. "Do you know, do you know what
is really unfair about his generation?"

"No."

"The smiles. Or, more precisely, the teeth
themselves. Like half the kids his age, Del's never had a cavity."

"You're kidding?"

"Not kidding. Never, not one. The fluoridation
came a little late for you and me, but he's never even heard a
dentist's drill up close."

"Doesn't seem fair."

"No." Bacall hesitated. "No, it
doesn't seem fair at all." Another hesitation. "I'm feeling
pretty sleepy, John." He released the ball, and it sought the
depression his hip made in the bed. "See you soon, eh?"

I took his hand the way he offered it, like a black
solidarity shake.

"Take care, Alec."

Closing the door behind me, I watched Wonsley get up.
"Alec said he was getting sleepy."

"They keep him pretty well sedated. That's one
of the problems, balancing all the different dosages."

"I have kind of a hard question."

Wonsley's tongue darted between his teeth and back
again. "Ask it.”

"He looks so much worse than the last time I saw
him. Should I be — "

"Trying to visit him more often?"

"That's not how I wanted to sound, but
basically, yes, that's my question."

"Like I said, I think Alec will come around from
this bout. But he's not responding well to the drugs, and if that
doesn't — well, it's no secret from you what we'll do then."

I dropped my voice. "The hospital will go along
with that?"

"The only way it can. The doctor will let me
sign Alec out for a home visit while he's back on an upswing so we
don't need all those tubes and shit. Then Alec and I will enjoy the
upswing as long as it lasts. When it's downhill again, I'll do for
him."

Without my saying anything, Wonsley continued. "I
grew up in Chicago, John, South Side. My daddy, he'd take me to the
lake, Lake Michigan. We'd go down to a la-de-dah yacht club like
Columbia, by where Monroe hits Lakeshore, and we'd fish from the
concrete walls. Back then it was lamprey time. Not much salmon, but
plenty of perch and other runts for me. Man, that water was blue.
Like a glacier melting into a stream, blue like it would hurt your
eyes. You don't expect that.

"Well, after my daddy died, I tried going to the
lake alone. I found out something real important. I could still fish,
because he'd taught me how to do it right. It wasn't as much fun
without him, but it was still good.

"I'm going to lose Alec, John. I know roughly
when, and I'm going to see to it that I know exactly when. And after
I lose him, life won't be so good for a while. But Alec's helped
teach me how to live, and it'll get better. I can't stop AIDS from
taking him, but I can stop it from taking me too."