Hosty leaned forward, eyes as wide as they could get in that fleshy face. "What?"
"You heard me. So I checked the paper, and guess what? Someone took a shot at some retired general four or five days before. Big right-winger. Just the kind of guy Lee hated."
"What did you do?"
"Nothing. I knew he had a pistol-he showed it to me one day-but the paper said the guy who shot at Walker used a rifle. Besides, most of my attention was taken up by my girlfriend by then. You asked why she had a knife in her purse. The answer is simple-she was scared. She was also attacked, only not by Mr. Roth. It was her ex-husband. He disfigured her pretty badly."
"We saw the scar," Hosty said, "and we"re sorry for your loss, Amberson."
"Thank you." You don"t look sorry enough, I thought. "The knife she was carrying was the same one her ex-John Clayton was his name-used on her. She carried it everywhere." I thought of her saying, Just in case. I thought of her saying, This is an in-case if there ever was one.
I put my hands over my face for a minute. They waited. I dropped them into my lap and went on in a toneless Joe Friday voice. Just the facts, ma"am.
"I kept the place on West Neely, but I spent most of the summer in Jodie, taking care of Sadie. I"d pretty much given up on the book idea, was thinking about reapplying at Denholm Consolidated. Then I ran into Akiva Roth and his goons. Wound up in the hospital myself. When they let me out, I went to a rehab center called Eden Fallows."
"I know it," Fritz said. "Kind of an a.s.sisted living thing."
"Yes, and Sadie was my chief a.s.sistant. I took care of her after her husband cut her; she took care of me after Roth and his a.s.sociates beat me up. Things go around that way. They make . . . I don"t know . . . a kind of harmony."
"Things happen for a reason," Hosty said solemnly, and for a moment I felt like launching myself over the table and pummeling his flushed and fleshy face. Not because he was wrong, though. In my humble opinion, things do happen for a reason, but do we like the reason? Rarely.
"Near the end of October, Dr. Perry okayed me to drive short distances." This was a blatant lie, but they might not check it with Perry for awhile . . . and if they made an investment in me as an authentic American Hero, they might not check at all. "I went into Dallas on Tuesday of this week to visit the apartment house on West Neely. Mostly on a whim. I wanted to see if looking at it would bring back some more of my memories."
I had indeed gone to West Neely, but to get the gun under the porch.
"Afterward, I decided to get my lunch at Woolworth"s, just like in the old days. And who should I see at the counter but Lee, having a tuna on rye. I sat down and asked him how it was going, and that was when he told me the FBI was hara.s.sing him and his wife. He said, "I"m going to teach those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds not to f.u.c.k with me, George. If you"re watching TV on Friday afternoon, maybe you"ll see something.""
"Holy cow," Fritz said. "Did you connect that with the president"s visit?"
"Not at first. I never followed Kennedy"s movements all that closely; I"m a Republican." Two lies for the price of one. "Besides, Lee went right on to his favorite subject."
Hosty: "Cuba."
"Right. Cuba and viva Fidel. He didn"t even ask why I was limping. He was totally wrapped up in his own stuff, you know? But that was Lee. I bought him a custard pudding-boy, that"s good at Woolworth"s, and only a quarter-and asked him where he was working. He told me the Book Depository on Elm Street. Said it with a big smile, as if unloading trucks and shifting boxes around was the world"s biggest deal."
I let most of his blather roll off my back, I went on, because my leg was hurting and I was getting one of my headaches. I drove home to Eden Fallows and took a nap. But when I woke up, the German guy"s how-did-you-miss crack came back to me. I put on the TV, and they were talking about the president"s visit. That, I said, was when I started to worry. I hunted through the pile of newspapers in the living room, found the motorcade route, and saw it went right by the Book Depository.
"I stewed about it all day Wednesday." They were leaning forward over the table now, hanging on every word. Hosty was making notes without looking down at his pad. I wondered if he"d be able to read them later. "I"d say to myself, Maybe he really means it. Then I"d say, Nah, Lee"s all hat and no cattle. Back and forth like that. Yesterday morning I called Sadie, told her the whole story, and asked her what she thought. She phoned Deke-Deke Simmons, the man I called her surrogate father-then called me back. She said I should tell the police."
Fritz said, "I don"t mean to add to your pain, son, but if you"d done that, your ladyfriend would still be alive."
"Wait. You haven"t heard the whole story." Neither had I, of course; I was making up sizable chunks of it as I went. "I told her and Deke no cops, because if Lee was innocent, he"d really be screwed. You have to understand that the guy was barely holding on by the skin of his teeth. Mercedes Street was a dump and West Neely was only a little better, but that was okay for me-I"m a single man, and I had my book to work on. Plus a little money in the bank. Lee, though . . . he had a beautiful wife and two daughters, the second one just newborn, and he could hardly keep a roof over their heads. He wasn"t a bad guy-"
At this I felt an urge to check my nose and make sure it wasn"t growing.
"-but he was a world-cla.s.s f.u.c.kup, pardon my French. His crazy ideas made it hard for him to hold a job. He said when he got one, the FBI would go in and queer things for him. He said it happened with his printing job."
"That"s bulls.h.i.t," Hosty said. "The boy blamed everyone else for problems he made himself. We agree on some things, though, Amberson. He was a world-cla.s.s f.u.c.kup, and I felt sorry for his wife and kids. Sorry as h.e.l.l."
"Yeah? Good for you. Anyway, he had a job and I didn"t want to lose it for him if he was just running his mouth . . . which was a thing he specialized in. I told Sadie I was going over to the Book Depository tomorrow-today, now-just to check up on him. She said she"d come with me. I said no, if Lee really was off his rocker and meant to do something, she could be in danger."
"Did he seem off his rocker when you had lunch with him?" Fritz asked.
"No, cool as a cuc.u.mber, but he always was." I leaned toward him. "I want you to listen to this part very closely, Detective Fritz. I knew she meant to go with me no matter what I told her. I could hear it in her voice. So I got the h.e.l.l out. I did that to protect her. Just in case."
And this is an in-case if there ever was one, the Sadie in my head whispered. She would live there until I saw her again in the flesh. I swore I would, no matter what.
"I thought I"d spend the night in a hotel, but the hotels were full. Then I thought of Mercedes Street. I"d turned in the key to 2706, where I lived, but I still had a key to 2703 across the street, where Lee lived. He gave it to me so I could go in and water his plants."
Hosty: "He had plants?"
My attention was still fixed on Will Fritz. "Sadie got alarmed when she found me gone from Eden Fallows. Deke did, too. So he did call the police. Not just once but several times. Each time, the cop who took his call told him to stop bulls.h.i.tting and hung up. I don"t know if anyone bothered to make a record of those calls, but Deke will tell you, and he has no reason to lie."
Now Fritz was the one turning red. "If you knew how many death threats we had . . ."
"I"m sure. And only so many men. Just don"t tell me that if we"d called the police, Sadie would still be alive. Don"t tell me that, okay?"
He said nothing.
"How did she find you?" Hosty asked.
That was something I didn"t have to lie about, and I didn"t. Next, though, they"d ask about the trip from Mercedes Street in Fort Worth to the Book Depository in Dallas. That was the part of my story most fraught with peril. I wasn"t worried about the Studebaker cowboy; Sadie had cut him, but only after he tried to steal her purse. The car had been on its last legs, and I had a feeling the cowboy might not even come forward to report it stolen. Of course we had stolen another one, but given the urgency of our errand, the police would surely not file charges in the matter. The press would crucify them if they tried. What I was worried about was the red Chevrolet, the one with tailfins like a woman"s eyebrows. A trunk with a couple of suitcases in it could be explained away; we"d had dirty weekends at the Candlewood Bungalows before. But if they got a look at Al Templeton"s notebook . . . I didn"t even want to think about that.
There was a perfunctory knock on the door of the interview room, and one of the cops who had brought me to the police station poked his head in. Behind the wheel of the cruiser, and while he and his buddy had been going through my personal belongings, he had looked stone-faced and dangerous, a bluesuit right out of a crime movie. Now, unsure of himself and bug-eyed with excitement, I saw he was no more than twenty-three, and still coping with the last of his adolescent acne. Behind him I could see a lot of people-some in uniform, some not-craning for a look at me. Fritz and Hosty turned to the uninvited newcomer with impatience.
"Sirs, I"m sorry to interrupt, but Mr. Amberson has a phone call."
The flush returned to Hosty"s jowls full force. "Son, we"re doing an interrogation here. I don"t care if it"s the President of the United States calling."
The cop swallowed. His Adam"s apple went up and down like a monkey on a stick. "Uh, sirs . . . it is the President of the United States."
It seemed they cared, after all.
7.
They took me down the hall to Chief Curry"s office. Fritz had me under one arm and Hosty had the other. With them supporting sixty or seventy pounds of my weight between them, I hardly limped at all. There were reporters, TV cameras, and huge lights that must have raised the temperature to a hundred degrees. These people-one step above paparazzi-had no place in a police station in the wake of an a.s.sa.s.sination attempt, but I wasn"t surprised. Along another timeline, they had crowded in after Oswald"s arrest and no one had kicked them out. As far as I knew, no one had even suggested it.
Hosty and Fritz bulled their way through the scrum, stone-faced. Questions were hurled at them and at me. Hosty shouted: "Mr. Amberson will have a statement after he has been fully debriefed by the authorities!"
"When?" someone shouted.
"Tomorrow, the day after, maybe next week!"
There were groans. They made Hosty smile.
"Maybe next month. Right now he"s got President Kennedy waiting on the line, so y"all fall back!"
They fell back, chattering like magpies.
The only cooling device in Chief Curry"s office was a fan on a bookshelf, but the moving air felt blessed after the interrogation room and the media microwave in the hall. A big black telephone handset lay on the blotter. Beside it was a file with LEE H. OSWALD printed on the tab. It was thin.
I picked up the phone. "h.e.l.lo?"
The nasal New England voice that responded sent a chill up my back. This was a man who would have now been lying on a morgue slab, if not for Sadie and me. "Mister Amberson? Jack Kennedy here. I . . . ah . . . understand that my wife and I owe you . . . ah . . . our lives. I also understand that you lost someone very dear to you." Dear came out deah, the way I"d grown up hearing it.
"Her name was Sadie Dunhill, Mr. President. Oswald shot her."
"I"m so sorry for your . . . ah . . . loss, Mr. Amberson. May I call you . . . ah . . . George?"
"If you like." Thinking: I"m not having this conversation. It"s a dream.
"Her country will give her a great outpouring of thanks . . . and you a great outpouring of condolence, I"m sure. Let me . . . ah . . . be the first to offer both."
"Thank you, Mr. President." My throat was closing and I could hardly speak above a whisper. I saw her eyes, so bright as she lay dying in my arms. Jake, how we danced. Do presidents care about things like that? Do they even know about them? Maybe the best ones do. Maybe it"s why they serve.
"There"s . . . ah . . . someone else who wants to thank you, George. My wife"s not here right now, but she . . . ah . . . plans to call you tonight."
"Mr. President, I"m not sure where I"ll be tonight."
"She"ll find you. She"s very . . . ah . . . determined when she wants to thank someone. Now tell me, George, how are you?"
I told him I was all right, which I was not. He promised to see me at the White House very shortly, and I thanked him, but I didn"t think any White House visit was going to happen. All during that dreamlike conversation while the fan blew on my sweaty face and the pebbled gla.s.s upper panel of Chief Curry"s door glowed with the supernatural light of the TV lights outside, two words beat in my brain.
I"m safe. I"m safe. I"m safe.
The President of the United States had called from Austin to thank me for saving his life, and I was safe. I could do what I needed to do.
8.
Five minutes after concluding my surreal conversation with John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Hosty and Fritz were hustling me down the back stairs and into the garage where Oswald would have been shot by Jack Ruby. Then it had been crowded in antic.i.p.ation of the a.s.sa.s.sin"s transfer to the county jail. Now it was so empty our footsteps echoed. My minders drove me to the Adolphus Hotel, and I felt no surprise when I found myself in the same room I"d occupied when I first came to Dallas. Everything that goes around comes around, they say, and although I"ve never been able to figure out who the mysteriously wise sages known as "they" might be, they"re certainly right when it comes to time-travel.
Fritz told me the cops posted in the corridor and below, in the lobby, were strictly for my own protection, and to keep the press away. (Uh-huh.) Then he shook my hand. Agent Hosty also shook my hand, and when he did, I felt a folded square of paper pa.s.s from his palm to mine. "Get some rest," he said. "You"ve earned it."
When they were gone, I unfolded the tiny square. It was a page from his notebook. He had written three sentences, probably while I was on the phone with Jack Kennedy.
Your phone is tapped. I will see you at 9 P.M. Burn this & flush the ashes.
I burned the note as Sadie had burned mine, then picked up the phone and unscrewed the mouthpiece. Inside, clinging to the wires, was a small blue cylinder no bigger than a double-A battery. I was amused to see that the writing on it was j.a.panese-it made me think of my old pal Silent Mike.
I jiggered it loose, put it in my pocket, screwed the mouthpiece back on, and dialed 0. There was a very long pause at the operator"s end after I said my name. I was about to hang up and try again when she started crying and babbling her thanks for saving the president. If she could do anything, she said, if anyone in the hotel could do anything, all I had to do was call, her name was Marie, she would do anything to thank me.
"You could start by putting through a call to Jodie," I said, and gave her Deke"s number.
"Of course, Mr. Amberson. G.o.d bless you, sir. I"m connecting your call."
The phone burred twice, then Deke answered. His voice was heavy and laryngeal, as if his bad cold had gotten worse. "If this is another G.o.ddam reporter-"
"It"s not, Deke. It"s me. George." I paused. "Jake."
"Oh, Jake," he said mournfully, and then he started to cry. I waited, holding the phone so tightly it hurt my hand. My temples throbbed. The day was dying, but the light coming in through the windows was still too bright. In the distance, I heard a rumble of thunder. Finally he said, "Are you all right?"
"Yes. But Sadie-"
"I know. It"s on the news. I heard while I was on my way to Fort Worth."
So the woman with the baby carriage and the tow truck driver from the Esso station had done as I"d hoped they would. Thank G.o.d for that. Not that it seemed very important as I sat listening to this heartbroken old man try to control his tears.
"Deke . . . do you blame me? I"d understand if you do."
"No," he said at last. "Ellie doesn"t, either. When Sadie made up her mind to a thing, she carried through. And if you were on Mercedes Street in Fort Worth, I was the one who told her how to find you."
"I was there."
"Did the son of a b.i.t.c.h shoot her? They say on the newscasts that he did."
"Yes. He meant to shoot me, but my bad leg . . . I tripped over a box or something and fell down. She was right behind me."
"Christ." His voice strengthened a bit. "But she died doing the right thing. That"s what I"m going to hold onto. It"s what you have to hold onto, as well."
"Without her, I never would have gotten there. If you could have seen her . . . how determined she was . . . how brave . . ."
"Christ," he repeated. It came out in a sigh. He sounded very, very old. "It was all true. Everything you said. And everything she said about you. You really are from the future, aren"t you?"
How glad I was that the bug was in my pocket. I doubted if they"d had time to plant listening devices in the room itself, but I still cupped my hand to the mouthpiece and lowered my voice. "Not a word about any of that to the police or the reporters."
"Good G.o.d, no!" He sounded indignant at the very idea. "You"d never breathe free air again!"
"Did you go ahead and get our luggage out of the Chevy"s trunk? Even after-"
"You bet. I knew it was important, because as soon as I heard, I knew you"d be under suspicion."
"I think I"ll be all right," I said, "but you need to open my briefcase and . . . do you have an incinerator?"