Mystery. Part 3

And then Tom uttered a remark that turned the stomach of each of the three adult men in the room. "I don't know anything about basketball except for what I learned from John Updike. Have any of you ever read Rabbit, Run?" Rabbit, Run?"

Of course none of them had-the coach thought that Tom was talking about an animal book.

Tom went to basketball practice for a month. The coach discovered that his new acquisition could not dribble or pa.s.s, was completely incapable of hitting the basket with the ball, and did not even know the names of the positions. Tom did get his friend Fritz Redwing, one of the guards, interested in Rabbit, Run Rabbit, Run by describing an act of oral s.e.x that took place in the book, and Fritz became so engrossed in the copy he filched from the An Die Blumen drugstore (no Redwing Tom ever knew would pay good money for anything as ridiculous as a book) that he excited the suspicions of his parents, who after three days plucked the paperback from his fingers and in horror, disbelief, and embarra.s.sment found themselves staring at the very pa.s.sage Tom Pasmore had described to their son. by describing an act of oral s.e.x that took place in the book, and Fritz became so engrossed in the copy he filched from the An Die Blumen drugstore (no Redwing Tom ever knew would pay good money for anything as ridiculous as a book) that he excited the suspicions of his parents, who after three days plucked the paperback from his fingers and in horror, disbelief, and embarra.s.sment found themselves staring at the very pa.s.sage Tom Pasmore had described to their son.

The elder Redwings would very likely have been more comfortable with the thought of their son actually performing some of the acts depicted on the page before them than with the fact of his reading about them. In a boy, s.e.xual experimentation could be put down to high spirits, but reading about such things smacked of perversion. They were shocked, and though they did not quite perceive this, they felt their values betrayed. Fritz quickly confessed that Tom Pasmore had told him about the dreadful book. And because the Redwings were the richest, most powerful, and most respected family on Mill Walk, Tom's reputation underwent a subtle darkening. He was perhaps not-perhaps not entirely reliable reliable.

Tom's response was that he preferred being not perhaps entirely reliable. Certainly he had no interest in being an imitation Redwing, though that was the goal of most of what pa.s.sed for society on Mill Walk. Redwing reliability consisted of thoughtless, comfortable adherence to a set of habits and traits that were generally accepted more as the only possible manners than as simple good manners.

One arrived at business appointments five minutes late, and half an hour late for social functions. One played tennis, polo, and golf as well as possible. One drank whiskey, gin, beer, and champagne-one did not really know much about other wines-and wore wool in the winter, cotton in summer. (Only certain brands and labels were acceptable, all others being either comically inappropriate or more or less invisible.) One smiled and told the latest jokes; one never publicly disapproved of anything, ever, nor too enthusiastically gave public approval, ever. One made money (or in the Redwings' case, conserved it) but did not vulgarly discuss it. One owned art, but did not attach an unseemly importance to it: paintings, chiefly landscapes or portraits, were intended to decorate walls, increase in value, and testify to the splendor of their owners. (When the Redwings and members of their circle decided to donate their "art" to Mill Walk's Museo del Kunst, they generally stipulated that the Museo construct facsimiles of their living rooms, so that the paintings could be seen in their proper context.) Similarly, novels told stories designed to be the summer entertainment of women; poetry was either prettily rhymed stuff for children or absurdly obscure and self-important; and "cla.s.sical" music obligingly provided a set of familiar melodies as a background for being seen in public in one's best clothes. One ignored as far as was possible any distasteful, uncomfortable, or irritating realities. One spent the summers in Europe, buying things, at South American resorts, buying other things, or "up north," ideally at Eagle Lake, drinking, fis.h.i.+ng, organizing lavish parties, and committing adultery. One spoke no foreign language, the idea was ridiculous, but a faulty and rudimentary knowledge of German, if a.s.similated at the knee of a grandparent who had once owned a great deal of eastern sh.o.r.e property and made a very good thing of it, was acceptable. One attended Brooks-Lowood and played in as many sports as possible, ignored and ridiculed the unattractive and unpopular, despised the poor and the natives, thought of any other part of the Western Hemisphere except Eagle Lake and its environs as unfortunate in exact relation to its dissimilarity to Mill Walk, went away to college to be polished but not corrupted by exposure to interesting but irrelevant points of view, and returned to marry and propagate oneself, to consolidate or create wealth. One never really looked worried, and one never said anything that had not been heard being said before. One belonged to the Mill Walk Founders Club, the Beach & Yacht Club, one or both of two country clubs, the alumni club of one's college, the Episcopal Church, and in the case of young businessmen, the Kiwanis Club, so as not to appear sn.o.bbish.

Generally, one was taller than average, blond, blue-eyed. Generally one had perfect teeth. (The Redwings themselves, however, tended to be short, dark, and rather heavyset, and to have wide s.p.a.ces between their teeth.) One branch of the Redwing family attempted to install fox hunting-"riding to hounds"-as a regular part of island life, but due to the absence of native foxes and the unfailing ability of the native cats and ferrets to evade the panting, heat-stricken imported hounds, the custom swiftly degenerated to regular annual partic.i.p.ation at the Hunt Ball, with the local males dressed in black boots and pink hacking jackets. As the nature of this attempt at an instant tradition might indicate, Mill Walk society was reflexively Anglophile in its tastes, drawn to chintz and floral patterns, conservative clothing, leather furniture, wood paneling, small dogs, formal dinners, the consumption of game birds, "eloquent" portraits of family pets, indifference to intellectual matters, cheerful philistinism, habitual a.s.sumption of moral superiority, and the like. Also Anglophile, perhaps, was the a.s.sumption that the civilized world-the world that mattered-by no means included all of Mill Walk, but only the far east end where the Redwings, their relatives, friends, acquaintances, and hangers-on lived, and, though this was debatable, Elm Cove, which lay to the western end of Glen Hollow Golf Club. Other outposts of the civilized world were: Bermuda, Mustique, Charleston, particular sections of Brazil and Venezuela-especially "Tranquility," the Redwing hideaway there-certain areas of Richmond, Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and London, Eagle Lake, the Scottish highlands, and the Redwing hunting lodge in Alaska. One might go anywhere in the world, certainly, but there was surely no real need to go anywhere but to these places, which between them made up the map of all that was desirable to a right-minded person.

To a reliable reliable person, one could say. person, one could say.

Tom became interested in Mill Walk's few murders, and kept a sc.r.a.pbook of clippings from the Eyewitness Eyewitness that concerned them. He did not know why he was interested in these murders, but every one of them left behind, on a hillside or in a room, a prematurely dispossessed body, a body that would otherwise be filled with life. that concerned them. He did not know why he was interested in these murders, but every one of them left behind, on a hillside or in a room, a prematurely dispossessed body, a body that would otherwise be filled with life.

Gloria was distressed when she discovered this sc.r.a.pbook, which was of ordinary, even mundane appearance, with its dark board covers that resembled leather and large stiff yellow pages-part of her distress was the contrast between the homely sc.r.a.pbook, suggestive of matchbook collections and photographs from summer camp, and the headlines that jumped from its pages: BODY DISCOVERED IN TRUNK. SISTER OF FINANCE MINISTER MURDERED IN ROBBERY ATTEMPT BODY DISCOVERED IN TRUNK. SISTER OF FINANCE MINISTER MURDERED IN ROBBERY ATTEMPT. She considered removing the sc.r.a.pbook from his room and confronting him with it, but almost immediately decided to pretend that she had not seen it. The sc.r.a.pbook was merely one of a thousand things that distressed, alarmed, or upset Gloria.

Most of Mill Walk's murders were as ordinary as the sc.r.a.pbook into which Tom glued their newspaper renderings. A pig farmer was. .h.i.t in the head with a brick and dumped, to be trampled and half-devoured by his livestock, into a pen beside his barn. BRUTAL MURDER OF CENTRAL PLAINS FARMER BRUTAL MURDER OF CENTRAL PLAINS FARMER, said the Eyewitness Eyewitness. Two days later, the newspaper reported SISTER OF FARMER CONFESSES: SISTER OF FARMER CONFESSES: Says He Told Me He Would Marry, I Had To Leave Family Farm Says He Told Me He Would Marry, I Had To Leave Family Farm. A bartender in the old slave quarter was killed during a robbery. One brother killed another on Christmas Eve: SANTA CLAUS DISPUTE LEADS TO DEATH SANTA CLAUS DISPUTE LEADS TO DEATH. After a native woman was found stabbed to death in a Mogrom Street hovel, SON MURDERED MOTHER FOR MONEY IN MATTRESS-MORE THAN SON MURDERED MOTHER FOR MONEY IN MATTRESS-MORE THAN $300,000! $300,000!

Gloria eventually decided to seek rea.s.surance from a sympathetic source.

Tom's English teacher at Brooks-Lowood, Dennis Handley, Mr. Handley, or "Handles" to the boys, had come to Mill Walk from Brown University, looking for sun, enough money to live reasonably well, a picturesque apartment overlooking the water, and a life reasonably free of stress. Since he enjoyed teaching, had spent the happiest years of his life at a draconian prep school in New Hamps.h.i.+re, was of an even-tempered, friendly nature, and had virtually no s.e.xual desires whatsoever, Dennis Handley had enjoyed his life on Mill Walk from the first. He had found that apartments on the water were beyond his price range, but almost everything else about his life in the tropics suited him.

When Gloria Pasmore told him about the sc.r.a.pbook, he agreed to have a talk with the boy. He did not know exactly why, but the sc.r.a.pbook sounded wrong wrong. He thought it might be a sourcebook for future stories, but the whole tone of the thing disturbed him-too morbid, too twisted and obsessive. Surely Tom Pasmore was not thinking of writing crime novels? Detective novels? Not good enough, he said to himself, and told Gloria, who seemed to have gone perhaps two drinks over her limit, that he would find out what he could.

Some time ago Dennis Handley had mentioned to Tom that he had begun collecting rare editions of certain authors while at Brown-Graham Greene, Henry James, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, primarily-and that Tom might come to look at these books any time he liked. On the Friday after his conversation with Gloria Pasmore, Dennis asked Tom if he would be free after school to look over his books and see if he'd like to borrow anything. He offered to drive him to his apartment and bring him back home afterward. Tom happily agreed.

They met outside Dennis's cla.s.sroom after the end of school and in a crowd of rus.h.i.+ng boys walked down the wide wooden stairs past a window with a stained gla.s.s replica of the school's circular seal. Because he was a popular teacher, many of the boys stopped to speak to Dennis or to wish him a good weekend, but few even said as much as h.e.l.lo to Tom. They scarcely looked at him. Except for the healthy glow of his skin, Tom was not a particularly handsome boy, but he was six-four. His hair was the same rough silky-looking blond as his mother's, and his shoulders stuck out impressively, a real rack of muscle and bone under his rumpled tweed jacket. (At this stage of his life, Tom Pasmore never gave the impression of caring about, or even much noticing, what clothes he had happened to put on that morning.) At first glance, he looked like an unusually youthful college professor. The other boys acted as though he were invisible, a neutral s.p.a.ce. They stood suspended on the stairs for a moment as the departing boys swirled about them, and as Dennis Handley talked to Will Thielman about the weekend's homework, he glanced at Tom, slouched in the murky green-and-red light streaming through the colored gla.s.s. The teacher saw how thoroughly Tom allowed himself to be effaced, as if he had learned how to melt away into the crowd-all the students poured downstairs through the dim light and the shadows, but Tom Pasmore alone seemed on the verge of disappearance. This notion gave Dennis Handley, above all a creature of sociability, of good humor and gossip, an unpleasant twinge.

Soon they were outside in the faculty parking lot, where the English teacher's black Corvette convertible looked superbly out of place among the battered Ford station wagons, ancient bicycles, and boatlike sedans that were the conventional faculty vehicles. Tom opened the pa.s.senger door, folded himself in half to get in, and sat with his knees floating up near the vicinity of his nose. He was smiling at his discomfort, and the smile dispelled the odd atmosphere of secrecy and shadows, which Handley had surely only imagined about the boy. He was the tallest person who had ever been in the Corvette, and Dennis told him this as they left the lot.

It was like sitting next to a large, amiable sheep dog, Dennis thought, as he picked up speed on School Road and the wind ruffled the boy's hair and fluttered his tie. "Sorry the s.p.a.ce is so tight," he said. "But you can push the seat back."

"I already did push the seat back," Tom said, grinning through the uprights of his thighs. He looked like a circus contortionist.

"Well, it won't be long," Dennis said, piloting the sleek little car south on School Road to Calle Berghofstra.s.se, then west past rows of shops selling expensive soaps and perfumes to the four lanes of Calle Drosselmeyer, where they drove south again for a long time, past the new Dos de Mayo shopping center and the statue of David Redwing, Mill Walk's first Prime Minister, past rows of blacksmiths and the impromptu booths of sidewalk fortune-tellers, past auto repair shops and shops dealing in pythons and rattlesnakes. They moved along in the usual bustle of cars and bikes and horse carts. Past the tin can factory and the sugarcane refinery, and further south through the little area of hovels, shops, and native houses called Weasel Hollow, where the woman who slept on "a king's ransom" (the Eyewitness) Eyewitness) had been murdered by her son. Dennis swerved expertly onto Market Street, weaved through and around a series of vans delivering produce to Ostend's Market, and zipped through the last seconds of a yellow light onto Calle Burleigh, where at last he turned west for good. had been murdered by her son. Dennis swerved expertly onto Market Street, weaved through and around a series of vans delivering produce to Ostend's Market, and zipped through the last seconds of a yellow light onto Calle Burleigh, where at last he turned west for good.

Tom spoke for the first time since they had left the school. "Where do you live?"

"Out near the park."

Tom nodded, thinking that he meant Sh.o.r.e Park, and that he must be planning on doing some shopping before he went home. Then he said, "I bet my mother asked you to talk to me."

Dennis snapped his head sideways.

"Why do you think she'd want me to talk to you?"

"You know why."

Dennis found himself in a predicament. Either he confessed that Gloria Pasmore had described Tom's sc.r.a.pbook to him, thereby admitting to the boy that his mother had looked through it, or he denied any knowledge of Gloria's concern. If he denied everything, he could hardly bring up the matter of the sc.r.a.pbook. He also realized that denial would chiefly serve to make him look stupid, which went against his instincts. It would also set him subtly against Tom and "on the side of" his parents, also counter to all his instincts.

Tom's next statement increased his discomfort. "I'm sorry you're worried about my sc.r.a.pbook. You're concerned, and you really shouldn't be."

"Well, I-" Handley stopped, not knowing how to proceed. He realized that he felt guilty, and that Tom was perceptive enough to see that too.

"Tell me about your books," Tom said. "I like the whole idea of rare books and first editions, and things like that."

So with evident relief, Dennis began describing his greatest bookfinding coup, the discovery of a typed ma.n.u.script of The Spoils of Poynton The Spoils of Poynton in an antiques shop in Bloomsbury. "As soon as I walked into that shop I had a feeling, a real in an antiques shop in Bloomsbury. "As soon as I walked into that shop I had a feeling, a real feeling feeling, stronger than anything I'd ever known," he said, and Tom's attention was once again completely focused on him. "I'm no mystic, and I do not believe in psychic phenomena, not even a little bit, but when I walked into that shop it was like something took possession took possession of me. I was thinking about Henry James anyhow, because of the scene in the little antiques shop in of me. I was thinking about Henry James anyhow, because of the scene in the little antiques shop in The Golden Bowl The Golden Bowl, where Charlotte and the Prince buy Maggie's wedding present-do you know the book?"

Tom nodded, extraordinary boy, and listened intently to the catalogue of goods in the antiques shop, the slightly enhanced depiction of the shop's proprietor, the grip of the mysterious "feeling" that increased as Handley wandered through the shabby goods, the excitement with which he had come across a case of worn books at the very back of the shop, and at last the discovery of a box of typed papers wedged between an atlas and a dictionary on the bottom shelf. Dennis had opened the box, almost knowing what he would find within it. At last he had dared to look. "They began in the middle of a scene. I recognized that it was The Spoils of Poynton The Spoils of Poynton after a few sentences-that's how keyed up I was. Now. That book was the first one James ever dictated-and he didn't dictate the whole thing. He had begun to have wrist trouble, and he hired a typist named William McAlpine after he began work on it. I knew I'd found McAlpine's dictation copy of the book, which he had later retyped, including James's handwritten chapters, to prepare a correct copy to send to James's publisher. I could never prove it, probably, but I didn't have to prove it. I knew what I had. I took it up to the little man, trembling like a leaf, and he sold it to me for five pounds, clearly thinking that I was a lunatic who'd buy anything at all. He thought I was buying it for the box, actually." after a few sentences-that's how keyed up I was. Now. That book was the first one James ever dictated-and he didn't dictate the whole thing. He had begun to have wrist trouble, and he hired a typist named William McAlpine after he began work on it. I knew I'd found McAlpine's dictation copy of the book, which he had later retyped, including James's handwritten chapters, to prepare a correct copy to send to James's publisher. I could never prove it, probably, but I didn't have to prove it. I knew what I had. I took it up to the little man, trembling like a leaf, and he sold it to me for five pounds, clearly thinking that I was a lunatic who'd buy anything at all. He thought I was buying it for the box, actually."

Dennis paused, in part because his listeners usually laughed at this point and in part because he had not described this moment for several years and his retelling had brought back to him its sensations of triumph and nearly uncontainable jubilation.

Tom's response brought him thumping to earth.

"Have you been reading about the murder of Marita Ha.s.selgard, the sister of the Finance Minister?"

They were back to the sc.r.a.pbook-Tom had whipsawed him. "Of course I have. I haven't had my head in a bag during the past month." He looked across at the pa.s.senger seat with real irritation. Tom had propped his legs on the dashboard, and was rolling a ballpoint pen in his mouth as if it were a cigar. "I thought you were interested in what I was saying."

"I'm very interested in what you were saying. What do you think happened to her?"

Dennis sighed. "What do I think happened to Marita Ha.s.selgard? She was killed by mistake. An a.s.sa.s.sin mistook her for her brother because she was in his car. It was late at night. When he discovered his mistake, he pushed her body into the trunk and left the island in a hurry."

"So you think that the newspaper is right?"

The theory that Dennis Handley had just expressed, held by most citizens of Mill Walk, had first been outlined in the editorial columns of the Eyewitness Eyewitness.

"Basically, yes. I suppose I do. I hadn't quite remembered that the paper put it like that, but if they did, then I think they are right, yes. Would you mind telling me how this relates to The Spoils of Poynton?" The Spoils of Poynton?"

"Where do you think the a.s.sa.s.sin came from?"

"I think he was hired by some political enemy of Ha.s.selgard-by someone who opposed his policies."

"Any policy in particular?"

"It could have been anything."

"Don't you think Ha.s.selgard ought to be careful now? Shouldn't he be heavily guarded?"

"Well, the attempt failed. The a.s.sa.s.sin took off. The police are looking for him, and when they find him, he'll tell them who hired him. If anybody ought to be afraid, it's the man who hired the killer."

All this, too, was conventional wisdom.

"Why do you think he put the sister's body in the trunk?"

"Oh, I don't really care where he put Marita," Dennis said. "I don't see what bearing that can possibly have on anything. The man looked into the car. He saw that he'd killed his intended victim's sister. He hid the body in the trunk. Why are we talking about this sordid business, anyway?"

"Do you remember what sort of car it was?"

"Of course. It was a Corvette. Identical to this one, in fact. I hope this is the end of these questions."

Tom leaned sideways toward him. He took the pen out of his mouth. "Just about. Marita was a big woman, wasn't she?"

"I can't see any possible point in going on-"

"I only have two more questions."

"Promise?"

"Here's the first one. Where do you suppose that woman in Weasel Hollow got the money she put under her mattress?"

"What's the second question?"

"Where do you think that feeling in the antiques shop came from, that feeling of knowing you were going to find something?"

"Is this still a conversation, or are we just free a.s.sociating?"

"You mean you have no idea where the feeling came from?"

Dennis just shook his head.

For the first time since they had turned onto Calle Burleigh, Tom paid some attention to the landscape of st.u.r.dy houses surrounding them. "We're nowhere near Sh.o.r.e Park."

"I don't live anywhere near Sh.o.r.e Park. Why would you think-oh." He smiled over at Tom. "I live near Goethe Park, not Sh.o.r.e Park. Just next to the old slave quarter. Ninety percent of the houses were built in the twenties and thirties, I think, and they're good, solid, middle-cla.s.s houses, with porches and arches and some interesting details. This area is tremendously underrated." He had by now recovered his habitual good humor. "I don't see why Brooks-Lowood shouldn't widen its net, so to speak."

Tom slowly turned his head to face the teacher. "Ha.s.selgard didn't attend Brooks-Lowood."

"Well, after all," the teacher said, "I can't see that where Ha.s.selgard went to secondary school has any bearing on his sister's murder." Tom's expression had begun to alarm him. Within a few seconds, his face had taken on an almost sunken look, and his skin seemed very pale beneath the thin golden surface. "Would you like to rest for a bit? We could stop off in the park and look at the ziggurats."

"I can't go any farther," Tom said.

"What?"

"Pull over to the side of the road. You can drop me off here. I feel a little queasy. Don't worry about me. Please."

Dennis had already pulled up to the curb and stopped his car. Tom had bent over to rest his head on the dashboard.

"You don't really think I'm going to drop you off on the side of the road, do you?"

Tom rolled his head from side to side on the dashboard. The gesture seemed so childlike that Dennis stroked Tom's thick hair.

"Good, because of course I'm not. I think I'll just take you back to my place and let you lie down for a bit."

He gently helped Tom lean back to rest his head against the seat. The boy's eyes glittered and seemed without depth, like s.h.i.+ny painted stones.

"Let me get you home," Dennis said.

Tom very slowly shook his head, then wiped his hands over his face. "Would you take me somewhere else?"

Dennis raised his eyebrows.

"Weasel Hollow."

Tom turned his head toward Dennis, and the English teacher felt as if he were looking not at a seventeen-year-old boy overcome by a sudden illness, but a powerful adult. He reached for the ignition key and started his car again.

"Anywhere in particular in Weasel Hollow?"

"Mogrom Street."

"Mogrom Street," Dennis repeated. "Well, that makes sense. Anywhere in particular on Mogrom Street?"

Tom had closed his eyes, and appeared to be asleep.

The original native civilization and culture on Mill Walk had completely disappeared by the beginning of the eighteenth century. Its only real remains, apart from the gap-toothed natives themselves, were the two little pyramidal ziggurats in the open field that had become Goethe Park. At the base of one was inscribed the word MOGROM MOGROM; at the base of the other, RAMb.i.+.c.hURE RAMb.i.+.c.hURE. Though no one now knew the meaning of these enigmatic words, they had been wholeheartedly adapted by the surviving native population. At the bottom of the narrow valley that was Weasel Hollow, Mogrom Street intersected Calle Ramb.i.+.c.hure. On opposing corners were the Mogrom Diner and Ramb.i.+.c.hure Pizza. Ramb.i.+.c.hure Hardware and Mogrom Stables and Smithy flanked Rambi-Mog p.a.w.nbrokers. On Calle Ramb.i.+.c.hure stood the Ziggurat School for Children of Indigenous Background, the Zig-Ram Drugstore, Rambi's Hosiery, the Mogrom Adult Bookstore, and M-R Artificial Limbs.

Dennis silently drove up Calle Burleigh, turned north on Market Street and zipped past Ostend's. He came to the rise called Pforzheimer Point. Across the narrow valley the long grey shapes of the Redwing Impervious Can Company and Thielman's Sugarcane Refinery defined the opposite horizon. Weasel Hollow lay below. Tom still seemed to be drowsing. Dennis drove over the lip of the hill and down toward Mogrom.

"Well, then," Tom said. He was sitting up straight, as if a puppeteer had pulled a string attached to the top of his head. He looked impatient, even slightly feverish. Dennis felt that if he drove downhill too slowly Tom would jump out of the car.

At the foot of the hill, Mogrom Street went east to Calle Ramb.i.+.c.hure and the center of Weasel Hollow. The western half of the street led directly into a maze of tarpaper shacks, tents made of blankets suspended on poles, native houses of pink and white stone, and huts that appeared to be made of propped-up boards. Two blocks down, a large black dog lay panting in the middle of the street. Goats and chickens wandered through the yellow gra.s.s between wrecked cars and ruined pony traps. Dennis dimly heard rock and roll coming from a radio.

Tom leaned forward to examine the numbers beside the porch of a native house. "Turn right."

"You do realize, don't you, that I have no idea what's going on?"

"Just drive slowly."

Handley drove. Tom inspected the houses and hovels on his side of the street. A goat swung his head, and chickens moved jerkily through the gra.s.s. They came up an intersection with a hand-painted sign reading CALLE CALLE F FRIEDRICH Ha.s.sELGARD. Two small native children with dirty faces, one of them in brown military-style shorts and carrying a toy gun, the other entirely naked, had materialized beside the sign and gazed at Dennis with a grave sober impertinence.

"Next block," Tom said.

Dennis moved slowly past the staring children. The dog lifted his head from the dust and watched them draw near. Dennis steered around it. The dog lowered its muzzle and sighed.

"Stop," Tom said. "This is it."

Dennis stopped. Tom had twisted sideways to look at a wooden shack. Waves of heat radiated up from the corrugated tin roof. It was obviously empty.

Tom opened the door and went through the tall yellow gra.s.s toward the house. Dennis expected him to look into the window beside the front door, but the boy disappeared around the side of the house. Behind the wheel of the Corvette, Dennis felt fat and hot and conspicuous. He imagined that he heard someone creeping up behind his car, but when he stuck his head through the window, it was only the dog thras.h.i.+ng its legs in its sleep. Dennis looked at his watch, and saw that four minutes had pa.s.sed. He closed his eyes and moaned. Then he heard footsteps crackling through the brittle gra.s.s and opened his eyes to the sight of Tom Pasmore walking back toward the car.

Tom was walking very quickly, his face as closed as a fist. He folded himself in half and dropped into the other seat without looking at Dennis. "Go around the corner."

Dennis twisted the key in the ignition, lifted his foot from the clutch, and the car jerked forward.

"La Bamba" came from one of the shuttered native houses, and for a moment Dennis thought of how like paradise it would be to stretch out his legs on a couch and take a long swallow of a gin and tonic.