Stranglehold (38 page)

He could disappear forever.

She didn't think he'd go that far—give up absolutely everything—but she'd never seen him as bad as this. He might.

She used a scarf from the backseat to bind the seeping puncture wound in the palm of her hand.

"I've got to get to a phone,
Cyn
. Fast."

"Your place is closest. And fast is my middle name." She told her what had happened.

The pavement roared by beneath them.

"Jesus,
Liddy
, you could have got yourself killed," she said. "What are you going to do?"

"Phone the police, phone Owen
Sansom
. Arthur's living there and that violates the judge's order. I'm going to phone everybody. Get help. And then get back there as fast as I can."

They pulled into the driveway and she was out of the car and at her door before Cindy even got the keys out of the ignition.

"You want to clean that hand up," she said.

"To hell with it."

She was already at the phone dialing 911. Her hands were trembling so that she punched the 1 button three times instead of twice but that didn't seem to matter.

She told the voice on the other end that it was an emergency, that her ex-husband was abusing her son and could very possibly be doing it even as they spoke and that Arthur was living with the
Danses
in defiance of a court order. It all came out in a rush but she was amazed at how lucid she sounded, how clear and firm she was.

"So you'd like us to go on out there, is that right?"

"Yes," she said. She gave him the address.

"Okay, ma'am," he said. "But I've got to be honest with you, technically speaking we've got the power to go and get your son and take him out of the home—if he's in immediate danger. If he's not in immediate danger you've got to go to a judge and get an order.
Is
your boy in immediate danger?"

"As far as I'm concerned he is, yes."

"As far as you're concerned. See, that's where maybe we've got a problem, like it might be some kind of gray area. That's what I was getting at. Like it's maybe a matter of opinion."

"There's a child molester living in the house with him for God's sake! How could it be a matter of opinion?"

"Ma'am, has Mr.
Danse
ever been convicted of a crime? Any crime?"

"Convicted? No. But the judge definitely believed that he ..."

"I know ma'am but,
y'see
, if he was convicted it would just be a whole lot easier. Tell you what, though—I'm going to speak to my supervisor about this, tell him I think we ought to go on up there and at least talk to these people. And I'll ask him to phone you back as soon as possible. That okay?"

"Can't you ...?"

"Ma'am, that's really all I can do right now. And I got to tell you it might take a little while. I'd like to give you priority on this but I can't. We've got a five-car pile-up out on highway 93 with one car I know of still burning. I mean, they're all over the road out there. So we're kind of shorthanded right at the moment. I'm sorry."

"How long?"

"A couple of hours, maybe."

Jesus!

And he wasn't promising her any action even then.

Duggan
, she thought.

"Listen, is Ralph Duggan there by any chance?"

"Left for home about half an hour ago. Why? You know Ralph?"

"Yes, I do."

"He know your situation?"

"I think he does. Part of it, anyway."

"Well that's a good idea, then. I'll still speak to my supervisor but Ralph might be able to get on it a whole lot quicker than we could. You got his home number?"

"No."

"Let me give it to you."

She wrote it down. She got the officer's name and thanked him and hung up and dialed again.

A woman answered.

"Hello, my name is Lydia
Danse
. Is Officer Duggan there?"

"No, I'm afraid not. Can I help you?"

"Do you expect him soon?"

She laughed. "Honestly? I never know."

"Please, could you ask him to call me? No, wait. Could you give him a message for me? Could you tell him that Lydia
Danse
phoned and that Arthur is at his parents' home despite Judge Burke's order and that I'm worried about my son Robert? And then could you ask him to call me?"

She gave the woman her number.

"And could you tell him it's an emergency?"

"Your son's name is ...?"

"Robert."

"Robert. Yes, certainly. I'll have him call."

She hung up and dialed Owen
Sansom
, then realized she'd dialed the office number instead of his home so she hung up and dialed again. Cindy appeared from the kitchen carrying two mugs of coffee and handed her one. She tasted it. It was liberally dosed with cognac.

"And don't tell me you don't need that," Cindy said.

"Hello?"

"Owen? Listen, Owen, he's up there."

"Up where?"

"Arthur. He's at his parents' house. He's been living there and god knows what he's been doing. They ordered me off it gunpoint.
Harry
did, of all people. Robert looks awful, Owen. He's terrified. We've got to get him out of there."

"I'll move on it right away. Get a judge to act
ex parte
to remove Robert from their care. Dammit all! It's Saturday night! We're not going to get anything on this until Monday morning."

"It can't wait, Owen! Jesus Christ, you didn't see him. He's crazy. He could do anything!"

"Look, maybe I can find a judge who's home tonight, or maybe Andrea Stone could, somebody who'll ..."

"
It won't wait!
You're not hearing me! Listen, do either of you have any clout with the police?"

"Andrea might. I ..."

"Can you call her for me? I talked to an Officer Morton who was going to speak to his supervisor about getting somebody up there as soon as possible. But he said it could be hours yet before they even get back to me. Maybe you or Andrea could light some kind of fire under them. I left a message for Ralph Duggan. I'm going to wait for him to call and then I'm going back there."

"Lydia, don't. You just said they ordered you off at gunpoint. "

"They won't order Ralph Duggan off at gunpoint."

"You don't know that either. Let him handle it. Let me try to get a judge ..."

"He's my son, Owen. And the courts have already failed him
twice
. Call me back if you get anything, okay?"

"Lydia ..."

"Call me."

And then there was nothing to do but wait. Somehow the coffee cup had emptied.

Magic.

"You think another cup would get me loaded?"

Cindy shook her head. "With the adrenaline you're pumping, I think it would take a good quart or two to get you loaded. You practically give off sparks."

She took the cup and went to the kitchen.

"I think I'll fix this hand up now," Lydia said.

"Good idea."

The puncture wasn't deep. In the bathroom she washed her hands. The soap and water made the scraped wrist sting and the puncture wound throb. She poured hydrogen peroxide over each of them and wiped the white foam off with cotton balls, poured and wiped again and then sprayed them both with
bacitracin
. She used a Band-Aid on the wrist and wrapped the hand with gauze and tied it off.

Her image in the mirror startled her. Cindy was right. She did nearly give off sparks. The eyes were wild. There were twigs and leaves in her hair and her face was smeared with mud. She wiped her face with a facecloth and brushed her hair.

She was almost finished when the phone rang.

"I've got it!" she called. She dropped the brush into the sink and ran down the hall to the phone. Cindy was already standing there with two more cups of doctored coffee.

"Hello?"

The silence on the other end was like a weight dropping onto her chest and told her exactly who it was.

"I don't need to talk to you now, Arthur," she said. "Yes you do."

She glanced at Cindy. She'd set the coffee down on the table by the phone and was watching her intently.

"Don't hang up, Lydia. You know my parents' house, right?"

"Of course I do."

"So you know where the phones are, right?"

"Arthur, what do you want?"

"Do you know where the phones are, Lydia?"

"Yes. One is in the kitchen and the other's upstairs in Ruth's bedroom. So what?"

"So Mom took the guest room for a while. Her room is my room now. Mine and Robert's. So guess where I'm calling you from,
Lyd
. I mean, guess which room. And guess who's sitting right here with me. Right next to me. Right here on the bed."

"Goddamn it, Arthur,
if you touch him
..."

His whisper in her ear was the voice of all her fears—and she knew that somehow it was also the voice of her fate and of her doom. She heard the rest of her life hiss away through the phone line like a nest of snakes surrounding her.

"
Lydia, I can do any fucking thing I want and you can't do shit. You got that? You useless fuck
. I'll be out of here tomorrow, and maybe I'll take him with me and maybe I won't. You want to make trouble about my being here? Who's to say I was here? Your word against mine. Robert's not going to say. The kid's not going to say. He told on me once and he knows where that got him. Don't you, Robert? Don't you, you miserable little
cocksucker
!"

She heard a muffled moan.

She slammed the phone down on the receiver. Coffee spilled across the rim of her mug.

"Stay here," she said. "Wait for Duggan's call. Or no—try calling him back. Tell him I'm on my way up there. If you can't reach him try the police again."

"What ...?"

"He's going to do something. Maybe he already has. I don't know. I'm going to stop him."

She ran up the stairs to her bedroom and flung open the closet door. She pushed away boots and shoes along the upper shelf until she found the cardboard shoe box with the Smith & Wesson Ladysmith .38 inside and the box of shells. She opened the cylinder and saw it was loaded. She put the shells in her pocket and ran back downstairs again and she was at the door and had it open before Cindy stopped her.

"
Liddy
, let me try the police again before you ..."

"No! Goddamn it,
I've gone by the book all the way on this!
I've tried everything.
The courts aren't protecting him, Cindy!
The police aren't protecting him. If the law won't help me get Robert away from that goddamn son of a bitch once and for all then I'll damn well do it myself!"