Ask the Parrot p-23 Page 5

  “What? Oh. Christ, I don’t know what’s the matter with me.”

  “You got shook up,” Parker told him. “It’s natural. Which way?”

  “Uh, left out of the parking lot.”

  Parker drove that way, seeing Lindahl’s SUV steady in his rearview mirror. “If I’m gonna make a turn,” he said, “tell me before I get to it.”

  “Yeah, I’m okay now. I’ll be okay.”

  “Good.”

  They drove two miles, and Parker became aware that Thiemann’s attention had gradually shifted from his own interior landscape to Parker’s profile. Thiemann frowned at him, quizzical, seeming to try to understand something. Parker said nothing, and then Thiemann faced front and said, “There’s a stop sign coming up. You’ll turn right.”

  “Good.”

  They made the turn, and ahead was another roadblock. Parker lowered his window, eased over to the shoulder, and waved Lindahl to overtake him. When Lindahl did, his own passenger window open, Parker called to him, “We’re with you, you’ve got our guns.”

  Lindahl nodded and drove ahead, Parker now following him. He said, “Tom know the way to your house?”

  “Sure.”

  “Good. He can lead the way, you don’t have to worry about telling me.”

  “Probably good.”

  Ahead, Lindahl slowed for the barricade. The cop there, local, not state, saw Lindahl’s membership card on the dash and waved him through, but Lindahl stopped, long enough to give the message. The cop looked toward the rifles on the floor in back, then nodded, waved Lindahl through again, and did the same to Parker; not grinning like the other one, but not stopping him, either.

  They drove on awhile in silence, trailing Lindahl now, and then Thiemann said, “You didn’t like that roadblock.”

  “It’s easier if they’ll wave you through it. And we wanted Tom out front to lead me.”

  “Yeah, but you didn’t like the roadblock.”

  “I don’t like any roadblock,” Parker said. “They make me nervous. People get tensed up, sometimes accidents happen.”

  “Nothing makes you nervous,” Thiemann said.

  Parker looked at him, then back at Lindahl up ahead.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I got the wind knocked out of me, up there, when I shot that guy.”

  “Sure you did.”

  “Tom felt it, too. But you didn’t.”

  “Maybe I just don’t show things that much.”

  “Maybe. But you were pretty cool. You knew what we should do and why we should do it. Tom and me, we wouldn’t have thought to leave that poor guy up there for the scavengers to eat. The first thing you said to me, what scavenger animals do we have around here?”

  “Because you were in trouble, Fred,” Parker told him. “You know you were. And Tom knows it, too.”

  “The second you saw that roadblock,” Thiemann said, “you were opening the window, getting off the road. You knew exactly what to say to Tom.”

  “It was easier to get waved through on Tom’s ticket than have to stop and go through all that.”

  “Just show ID,” Thiemann said.

  “It was easier not to.”

  Thiemann looked out the windshield, not saying anything more, but thinking it over. He was suspicious of something, but he didn’t know what. He had sensed the otherness in Parker, but he didn’t know what it meant.

  An older Cadillac convertible, bright red, top down, big as a speedboat, came the other way, suddenly honking madly. The three guys in it, middle-aged, in their bright orange or red hunting caps, waved hands with beer cans in them at Lindahl, who honked and waved back but didn’t stop. Neither did the Cadillac, which went on by, the three guys all grinning and shouting things, now at Parker and Thiemann. They were very happy. Parker nodded but didn’t honk.

  “That’s part of our group,” Thiemann said.

  “I know.”

  “They shouldn’t be drinking. That’s the worst thing you can do.” Then Thiemann turned away with a grimace. “Almost the worst thing.”

  Ahead, Lindahl signaled for a left, and Parker did, too. “How much farther?”

  “A couple miles.” Thiemann turned toward him again. “You don’t think much of us, do you?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Not just those guys with the beer,” Thiemann said. “All of us, running around, being man hunters. You could see in those troopers’ eyes, they thought we were all just a joke. Useless, and a joke. And I could see it in your eyes, too. You think the same thing.”

  Parker followed Lindahl around the turn. Thiemann’s sense of Parker’s otherness, which had led him toward suspicion, had now led him to embarrassment instead; Parker wasn’t an alien from outside them, unknown and untrusted, he was a judge from above them, finding them wanting. Good; that moved Thiemann away from a direction that might have caused trouble.

  “Isn’t that right, Ed? You think the same thing?”

  “Not a joke,” Parker said. “You just don’t have the training. I suppose, if you’d been trained, up there in the woods, you wouldn’t have moved quite so fast.”

  “Not quite so fast.” Thiemann barked a laugh with no amusement in it. “You’d think, with the training, the trained guy’d be faster.”

  “The trained guy knows when to be fast,” Parker said.

  “You trained, Ed?”

  “Some.”

  “I thought so. It’s here.”

  This area was more suburban than country, with curving roads flanked by neat small houses on large green lots. Lindahl, signaling for a right, didn’t turn but came to a stop just beyond a driveway. At the other end of the driveway was a tan stucco ranch with attached two-car garage.

  Parker, turning in at the driveway, said, “Which garage?”

  “Doesn’t matter, they’re both full of junk.”

  Parker stopped, switched off the engine, and opened his door. But Thiemann went on just sitting there. Parker said, “The sooner you talk to her, the better.”

  “What the hell am I gonna say?”

  “Honey, I made a mistake today.”

  Thiemann’s expression was haggard. “That’s a hell of a way to put it.”

  “It’s what happened.”

  “A mistake.”

  “Let’s get out of the car.”

  They got out of the Taurus and looked at each other across its top. “I keep thinking,” Thiemann said, “it’s a good thing for me you didn’t get impatient. I don’t know why I keep thinking that.”

  “I got nothing but patience,” Parker told him. “I’m on vacation. Go talk to your wife.”

  “I will. Maybe I’ll see you around, before you leave.”

  “Maybe,” Parker said.

  10

  Parker got into the Ford, and Lindahl immediately shifted into drive. Then, looking at the empty suburban street as it curved away in front of them, he said, “How is he?”

  “You know him better than I do.”

  “Not in something like this.” Lindahl gave Parker a quick uneasy look, as though not sure how to explain himself, then faced the road. “This isn’t something that just happened,” he said. “He shot a man. I can’t even imagine that.”

  “You tried to stop him.”

  “He was just too—” Lindahl paused while he turned out of the suburb onto a country road. “Fred likes to be in charge,” he said. “He likes to think he’s the guy can take care of it, whatever it is.”

  “Can he take care of what he’s got now?”

  Another quick glance. “What do you mean?”

  “He’s in shock,” Parker said. “So right now he doesn’t know what he’s thinking. Also, down inside, he has the idea he ought to be punished. That could lead him to the law, which would be bad for everybody.”

  “Especially you.”

  “No, especially Fred. He may like to pretend he’s in charge, but he’s in foreign territory now. His grandfather’s memories aren’t gon
na help him.”

  Lindahl snorted. “I bet he’s sorry he said that.”

  “Maybe, later.”

  “I’ll tell you something could help him,” Lindahl said, “that he wouldn’t ever talk about. His oldest son is in jail.”

  “How did that happen?”

  “He was in the army, they sent him to the Middle East, teach those people all about democracy. He met a couple young local guys taught him a few things of their own. These are fellas walk into your house, walk out with stuff they didn’t have before.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Not like you. Small-time. Impressed George, though. He came back, he told everybody about them. They even had a special slang for them. Hawasim, it means looter.” Lindahl shrugged. “I guess it’s not as easy to be a looter in a war zone.”

  “Probably not.”

  “Young George thought he was hawasim himself, now he’s doing three to five in Attica, the last thing Fred wants is to be in the next cell.”

  “Good.”

  They drove on, silent a while. Parker thought the shock of a son in prison must have been almost as strong for Thiemann as the second shock that had hit him today. Would the double hit make him likelier to withdraw into himself, stay quiet, not make trouble? Or would it make him spin out of control?

  “I want to do it,” Lindahl said.

  There had been close to ten minutes of silence in the car, and now Lindahl spoke abruptly, as though not wanting to forget what he had to say. Or as though not wanting the chance to change his mind. The words had been forceful but flat, Lindahl’s expression intense.

  Parker said, “The track?”

  “I hadn’t seen any of those people for years,” Lindahl said. “What’d Fred say? Three years? He’s right, I don’t know them any more, and they don’t know me. They don’t give a shit about me.”

  “They haven’t seen you.”

  “They have an opinion about me,” Lindahl said, “and that’s all they need. You heard what Fred said. I lost my job, lost my wife, turned sour, end of story.”

  “You didn’t give them any other story.”

  “Because it’s true.” Lindahl nodded at the road in front of them, agreeing with himself. “As long as I stay around here,” he said, “I’m just what they think I am. A hermit, Fred said. Didn’t destroy my life just the once, destroy it all over again every day.” Another emphatic nod, this time with an emphatic glare in Parker’s direction. “As long as I’m here,” he said, “that’s who I am, there’s no hope I’ll ever get out of this. I have to go down and take that money from the track because otherwise I’m dead here, I’m just walking around dead, all by myself.” He laughed, a bitter sound. “With a parrot that doesn’t talk.”

  “We’ll drive down there,” Parker said. “After dark.”

  Lindahl took a long shuddering inhale and slowly let it out. “I’m a new guy,” he said. “I don’t look it yet, but that’s what I am.”

  11

  With the sound off, the television set seemed to be saying that nothing much had happened. Parker gave Lindahl back his outer coat and boots, and then Lindahl went off to find some take-out food. “You don’t want any of that rabbit I got,” he said. “And neither do I, any more.”

  “Fine,” Parker said.

  Lindahl shrugged into his coat. “There’s nothing real close around here,” he said. “I’ll probably be an hour.”

  Parker said, “If you run into anything I should know, call here.”

  “You’re not going to answer the phone.” Lindahl looked startled.

  “No, I’m not. But I’ll hear what you tell the answering machine.”

  “Oh. Fine. Good.”

  Lindahl left, and Parker went back to the kitchen where, first time through, he’d seen a drawer of tools. First taking the wad of four thousand in new cash from his pocket, he stuffed it deep into the bad-smelling garbage bag under the sink, washed his hands, and turned to the tool drawer. From it he selected a hammer, a Phillips-head screwdriver, a flathead screwdriver, a hacksaw, and a flashlight. He also took, from the bedroom, a right handed black leather glove. Then he left the converted garage, carrying everything, and walked over to the rear of the boarded-up house.

  It was now almost seven in the evening, twilight, just enough illumination left in the sky to see what you were doing. The few houses he could see with lights in their windows looked darker than the rest of the world. No traffic moved out on the road, no sounds could be heard but the small movements of little animals.

  Parker stopped at the rear door of the house to study what was here. The door was up two concrete steps from ground level, with filigree iron railings on both sides. A piece of half-inch plywood had been cut to fit between the railings, then screwed to the door frame on both sides and across the top. There were a total of fourteen Phillips-head screws, which would have been put in with a power drill, a tool Lindahl didn’t have.

  The big question was what length screws they’d used. For half an inch of plywood, a one-inch screw would be plenty, but a guy with a power drill wouldn’t mind putting in longer screws, if they were handy.

  Parker put on the glove, picked up the Phillips-head screwdriver from the concrete step where he’d laid all the tools, and went to work. The first screw didn’t want to budge, having been put in position here a long time ago. Two-handed, he gave it quick hard twists, and at last it unstuck and then turned as smoothly as if it had been oiled.

  One-inch; good. Parker pocketed it and went on to the next.

  Some of the screws were a little easier, some a little harder, but it all came out to the same; a quarter hour to remove all the screws. Then he pulled the plywood back, to show beyond it an ordinary kitchen door with four windowpanes in its upper half. The doorknob had been removed, because it would have stuck out in the way of the plywood.

  The next step was to alter the screws to his own purpose. Turning the sheet of plywood sideways, he leaned it against the front of the railings and put all the screws back in place except for one low on the left side. He turned the screws in only partway, leaving less than a quarter inch of the head still jutting out. He then used the hacksaw to slice off all the screw points back flush to the wood before seating the screws completely into place as before. Now, when the plywood was in position, it would look the same as before, but a simple tug at the top would pull it free.

  The screw he hadn’t put back he fixed into the upper middle of the plywood on the house side, turning it in only partway, so that it wouldn’t show on the outside. From inside the house, that would now be the handle to pull the plywood back into place.

  Next was the door. He removed the glove, held it against the pane of glass nearest the missing knob, and hit it with the hammer. The muffled jingle of the breaking glass echoed mostly into the house. Knocking the last couple of shards out of the way, he reached in, found the knob still in place on the inside, turned it, and the door had not been locked; no reason to.

  He pushed the door open and stepped in, feet crackling on the broken glass. Turning back, he picked up the plywood and moved it into position, guided by the iron railings that flanked the door. When he pulled the plywood upright against the wall by the screw he’d just added, it fit snugly into place, the shortened screws sliding into the previous holes just enough to hold.

  Now the house. The plywood over all the doors and windows made the interior completely black. Switching on the flashlight, Parker saw the house had not been stripped. When the town fathers had sealed it up, they’d still hoped to find a buyer someday, so the plumbing was still here, and the electric fixtures, even the sink and a thirty-year-old refrigerator with its door propped open by a plastic milk box. The electricity and water had been switched off, but that was to be expected.

  Parker moved through the dusty empty rooms and found nothing he didn’t expect to find. A coating of gray on the floorboards, walls faded to a dull noncolor, long cobwebs in the corners and around the blinded windows. No one had been
in here since the plywood had been put up.

  Back in the kitchen, he put the flashlight on the counter near the back door; if he had to come back, there wouldn’t be time to find some other light source.

  There was nothing else here he needed to do or know. He left the house, pulled the door not quite shut, set the sheet of plywood in place, and went back to the converted garage to wait for dinner.

  12

  We’ve got a problem tonight,” Parker said, “getting to this track of yours.”

  Lindahl put his beer can down. “What’s that?”

  They were seated in the living room, eating acceptable pizza, Lindahl drinking beer, Parker water. Outside, full dark had arrived. The silent television set showed sitcoms, so nothing else had happened. In its cage, the parrot seemed mostly asleep, though every once in a while it swiveled its head and made a small gurgling sound and marched a bit in place.

  Parker said, “They’re looking for two men. They don’t know if the two men are still together or if they separated. Once we get where your gun club card doesn’t count for anything, when we come to a roadblock and they see two men in the car, they’ll want ID from both.”

  “And you can’t show any.”

  “Nothing useful.”

  Lindahl thought about that, chewing pizza. “The funny thing is,” he said, “once we get to the track, I can help you with ID, but not before.”

  Parker frowned at him. “Help? How?”

  “Every employee carries an encoded ID card,” Lindahl told him. “You wear it in a plastic sleeve hangs around your neck. I’m the one bought the machine, I chose it, I know how to use it. I could take your driver’s license, photograph it, change the information in the machine, print it out on one of our own laminated blanks. It won’t be perfect, but it’ll look a lot like the real thing.”

  “But not till we get there,” Parker said.

  “If my vehicle had a trunk—”

  “No.”

  “Well, it doesn’t, anyway. But the point is, if we can get you there, we can solve your ID problem.”

  Parker thought about that. He saw what to do, but he didn’t like it. Lindahl was so unsure of himself, Parker needed to keep him on a tight leash, but now he couldn’t. If Lindahl had time off by himself, would he decide the hell with it, let’s call in the cops?